<P> Therefore, the fundamental task for the socialist stage is to develop the productive forces . The superiority of the socialist system is demonstrated, in the final analysis, by faster and greater development of those forces than under the capitalist system . </P> <P> As they develop, the people's material and cultural life will constantly improve . One of our shortcomings after the founding of the People's Republic was that we didn't pay enough attention to developing the productive forces . Socialism means eliminating poverty . Pauperism is not socialism, still less communism ." </P> <Tr> <Td>--Chinese paramount leader Deng Xiaoping on June 30, 1984 </Td> </Tr> <P> At the milestone Third Plenum of the National Party Congress's 11th Central Committee which opened on December 22, 1978, the party leaders decided to undertake a program of gradual but fundamental reform of the economic system . They concluded that the Maoist version of the centrally planned economy had failed to produce efficient economic growth and had caused China to fall far behind not only the industrialized nations of the West but also the new industrial powers of Asia: Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, and Hong Kong . </P>

How has china attempted to increase its gdp