Fear of China 'hard landing' stalks Davos

DAVOS (AFP) - The risk of a hard landing for the economy in China as well as the threat of military conflict with Japan stoked fears at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Friday.

Days after the world's second-largest economy registered its worst rate of growth for more than a decade, top politicians and economists at the annual gathering of the global elite said the near-term outlook was bleak.

Leading Chinese economist and former central bank official Li Daokui said: "This year and next year, there will be a struggle, a struggle to maintain a growth rate of 7-7.5 per cent, which is the minimum to create the 7.5 million jobs every year China needs." On January 20, Beijing announced that its economy had grown at 7.7 per cent in 2013, the worst rate since 1999.

"The risk of a hard landing in China has not been dispelled yet," added Nouriel Roubini, the economist who earned the nickname "Dr Doom" for predicting the collapse of the US housing market and global recession in 2008.