The Communist Party of China's elite will gather in an annual meeting at Beidaihe seaside resort. (Photo : Getty Images)
Top officials of the Communist Party of China are collecting information throughout the country in preparation for the annual policy-making meeting at the Beidaihe seaside resort.
According to the South China Morning Post, the CPC's leaders are combing through the country in several fact-finding missions to determine economic and social concerns that could be subject of their meeting this summer.
The vacation-like gathering of the Politburo Standing Committee, which includes the CPC's secretary-general President Xi Jinping, entails crafting of policies that could help the government pull the country from the economic slowdown it is currently experiencing following an all-time high credit-fuelled growth in the economy.
Beidaihe Meeting
During the previous years, the Beidaihe meeting hosted the creation of policies that made China what it is today.
Located 300 kilometers east of Beijing, Beidaihe is a seaside resort by the Bohai Bay in Hebei Province where the Party's elite gather every summer between July and August to tackle the country's biggest dilemmas.
A 2015 report from the Global Times said it was a setting where the CPC leaders "are expected to slip away from the summer heat of Beijing" in order to get their heads clear for the task ahead.
"It is an informal meeting where leaders take a short vacation, while reaching for consensus for the country's development path," the outlet quoted CPC Central Committee Party School professor Zhang Xixian at the time.
According to Zhang, last year's Beidaihe meeting tackled the success of the corruption crackdown spearheaded by Xi and the overall direction of the civil service team.
Back then, they also discussed the development of the world's second biggest economy, particularly China's 13th Five-Year Plan that would run through 2020.
This Year's Meeting
This year, the meeting is expected to focus on the problems all over the country that the Party's elite were able to gather during their fact-finding missions.
One of them is the effects of the commercial logging ban to gross domestic product in the northeastern provinces like Heilongjiang, where the younger people are moving elsewhere due to the loss of steam for their heavy-industry base.
"The problem for the northeastern provinces is extremely difficult to solve, that's why leaders have visited the region again and again," SCMP quoted a bank analyst who declined to be named.
"Ageing problems, obsolete policies and limited innovation capabilities all hinder the development of the region" he added. "Even after leaders' on-the-ground investigations, it's hard to say if any effective policies will be issued to address the chronic problems."
Because of this, the SCMP believes that this year's summer Politburo meeting would concentrate on how to cut back traditional industries that are not performing very well, and promote emerging sectors and technology to boost the economy.
