CHINA'S National People's Congress was told by premier Li Keqiang last week that the country's gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate this year would be "around" seven per cent, down from 7.4 per cent last year.

Predictably, this provoked media reports of a slowdown in the world's second-largest economy.

But the question that journalists (and their editors) should ask themselves more often is: "Seven per cent of what?"