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China's Leaders Want To Slow Their Heated Economy

ARI SHAPIRO, Host:

NPR's Louisa Lim reports from Beijing on how difficult that could be.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

LOUISA LIM: China's government's new economic growth target is seven percent a year, way down from the past five sizzling years, which averaged 11.2 percent annual growth.

ZHANG PING: (Foreign language spoken)

LIM: China Merchants Bank chairman, Ma Weihua, spelled out his doubts to NPR.

MA WEIHUA: (Foreign language spoken) (Through Translator) Local governments want fast development to increase their revenues and improve peoples' lives. But nationally, over-fast development could harm stable development and increase inflation.

LIM: Chen Xitao from Anhui province is typical.

CHEN XITAO: (Foreign language spoken) (Through Translator) The report just states a goal. I should say that our province is less developed. Our growth will definitely be faster than seven percent.

LIM: Louisa Lim, NPR News, Beijing. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

Beijing Correspondent Louisa Lim is currently attending the University of Michigan as a Knight-Wallace Fellow. She will return to her regular role in 2014.