The country's rural revitalization had started to take course prior to the government's economic stimulation package. On October 20, the National Development and Reform Commission said it would ramp up the minimum grain purchase price by a mighty 15.3 percent, the third hike of its kind this year.

Chen Shuwei, a senior agricultural analyst at Beijing Orient Agribusiness Consultant Ltd., told Beijing Review that the ensured grain purchases would add incentives for the farmers to strive for bumper harvests, driving up sales of fertilizers, seeds, pesticides and farm machinery in the process. The subsidies also would relieve the farmers of some financial burdens, allowing them to buy more farm implements, he said.

"But recent grain purchase price hikes are still far from enough to ensure a decent profit for farmers as the grain prices had been overly depressed in the past to combat inflation," Chen said. "More supportive measures are still needed to shore up the weak agriculture."

Hi-tech take-off

The recent stimulus plan bears quite a close resemblance to the one the government devised in 1998 shortly after the Asian financial crisis. Both depend on spectacular government investments to fuel growth. But the biggest difference is the new one will be much more sustainable. The government highlighted the importance of hi-tech industries that are more energy-efficient and value-added, indicating a bright prospect for new hi-tech sectors such as new energy and new materials.

Over the next few years, hi-tech enterprises are expected to benefit from heavier government funding and higher tax breaks. Moreover, the impending value-added tax reform also encourages enterprises to purchase advanced equipment for technical innovation.

While details about the concrete support policies are yet to be made known publicly, the pace of local government investments in hi-tech has moved up a notch. Shandong Province recently lined up 35 hi-tech projects worth 40.7 billion yuan ($6 billion).

"Since the labor-intensive manufacturers have been caught in a bind due to more expensive resources, the future of the Chinese economy lies with the hi-tech boom and industrial upgrading." Zhuang Jian said. "Only high technologies can sharpen the core competitive edge of enterprises and underpin their resilience to external economic fluctuations."

Zuo Xiaolei noted that China has left behind the phase of blindly chasing economic scale and should now focus on quality of the growth.

"As a result, even in hard times we should still prioritize the promotion of rural markets and hi-tech industries which are the inexhaustible sources of healthy growth," she said. "What matters right now is how to effectively implement the stimulus programs. Only when the plans are seriously put through can they translate into tangible benefits."