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CHINA could start booming again just a year after the economy of the world's largest emerging market was punctured following the end of the Olympic Games construction bonanza.
The World Bank today raised its 2009 economic growth forecast for China from 6.5% to 7.2% .
Though that is down on the Beijing government's ambitious 8% target for 2009, it is the strongest rate of growth of any major world economy, and compares favourably with the peak of the Chinese boom in 2007 which expanded at 13%.
A $580 billion (£353.5 billion) stimulus by Beijing will "strongly support growth" this year, said Ardo Hansson, the World Bank's lead economist for China, by pumping money into the country's economy through higher spending on public works.
The World Bank cut its 2009 forecasts for China last November from 9.2% to 7.5% and again in March to 6.5%. It now says the growth rate for 2010 will be 7.7%.
The China upgrade came as business leaders meeting in Seoul at the World Economic Forum on East Asia said the end of the current recession will see Asia take leadership in the world economy.
Peter Sands, chief executive of Standard Chartered Bank, said: "There is no doubt the crisis has accelerated the shift in economic power from the West towards Asia."
