LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – China’s leader-in-waiting Xi Jinping yesterday dismissed worries of a hard landing for his country’s economy and turned to courting American companies and states hungry for a slice of Chinese growth on the final day of his US visit.
Vice President Xi and his US counterpart Joe Biden also suggested Xi’s five-day visit could pave the way for steadier ties between the world’s two biggest economies, with Biden praising Xi’s eagerness to understand America.
Xi, turning to courting American companies and governors hungry for a slice of his nation’s growth, told a business forum in Los Angeles the world’s No 2 economy will continue to push domestic demand while directing investment toward the United States.
Xi said “2012 will be a crucial year in driving the 12th five-year plan. China’s economy will maintain stable growth. … There will be no so-called hard landing.”
“We will encourage more consumption, imports and outward investment,” he told a business forum in Los Angeles on the final leg of his US visit, drawing light applause. Xi is almost certain to succeed Hu Jintao as Chinese president in just over a year, and his tour of the United States has featured commercial deals and reassuring talk intended to blunt American ire about the trade gap between the countries.
Xi said China was committed to expanding imports from the United States.
“We will further increase imports from other countries in the light of our economic and social development and consumer demand. We will actively expand imports from the United States, including Los Angeles,” he told a midday meeting in the city.
Xi said he felt from his visit that “mainstream American opinion” supports stronger ties. “I can now say that my visit has been fully successful,” he said.
The 58-year-old former Shanghai party secretary found time for less weighty matters, including a quick detour to the International Studies Learning School in South Gate — an urban Los Angeles enclave of mainly Hispanics.
Biden and Xi met with students studying Chinese and watched as students performed a traditional dragon dance to drums and performed kung fu moves to applause. More than the current, publicly stiff Chinese President Hu Jintao, Xi has made an effort to put a friendlier public face on his government during his US visit, including revisiting the small town of Muscatine in Iowa where he visited in 1985 and stayed two nights with a family.
At the school, Xi recalled his first visit to Muscatine, and said: “They gave me the same impression that, like Chinese people, they are warm-hearted, friendly, honest and hard-working. Twenty-seven years have passed, but that remains my impression, and it has become a deeper one.”
Xi offered a glimpse of his personal life, telling the students he enjoyed watching sports, including American basketball, baseball and gridiron football.
