Lower growth target expected to be set at China congress

Beijing

CHINA'S National People's Congress (NPC) will convene from Thursday for the next 10 days, when about 3,000 delegates will validate the government's work over the past year and approve general policies for this year.

The parliament, which brings China's provincial delegates to Beijing, primarily rubber-stamps the annual budget and the various government reports.

Most policies would have already been decided behind closed doors ahead of the NPC, so no major surprise announcements are expected; the annual event is mainly a platform to build understanding of the government's policies; communist-party wording …