China's economy is likely to stop falling and begin to stabilize with a predicted 7.2 percent GDPgrowth in 2015, according to latest forecast report released by the Chinese Academy ofSciences on Friday.

The report, the 2015 China Economic Forecast and Outlook, was published by the Center forForecasting Science under the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The annual report focuses onChina's major economic indicators.

According to the report, steady economic growth in 2015 is to be expected, though the GDPgrowth rate is still predicted to drop by 0.2 percentage points from that of 2014.

China's GDP growth rate has been on continuous decline since 2010, and had drooped to 7.4percent in 2014, reaching the lowest record in 24 years, according to the National Bureau ofStatistics.

"China is going through an economic transformation period from 2011 to 2015, with the pace ofgrowth adjusting from high-speed to medium-to-high-speed. However, with a series of importantreform measures adopted by the government, such as expanding free trade zones and the ‘OneBelt and One Road' initiative, the economy this year is likely to run smoothly," said Chen Xikang,an operational research expert who took part in writing the forecast.

The "One Belt and One Road" plan, refers to the Silk Road Economic Belt and the Maritime SilkRoad of the 21st Century, was an initiative put forward by President Xi Jinping in 2013 topromote trade and communications in the region.

In 2014, bilateral trade volume between China and countries in the region enjoyed a 7 percentyearly increase.

"The economic growth rate is unlikely to drop below 6 percent in the coming one and a halfdecades," Chen said.

Chen predicts that the average annual GDP growth rate will hover between 6 percent to 8percent till the year 2030, and then further decrease to 4 percent to 6 percent over the next 20years, if not influenced by profound changes in external demand or government intervention.

Zhu Baoliang, director and chief economist of the Economic Forecast Department under theState Information Center, another forecasting research institute, is less optimistic for the year2015.

"Although I basically agree with the forecasting logic of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, myresearch results show that this year's GDP growth rate is at best 7 percent," he said.

"China's excess capacity problem could not just be cyclical. Instead, it is a structural problem.The growth rate will see no improvement until most existing capacity is put to productive use," hesaid.

Niu Wenyuan, an expert on sustainable development as well as a consultant for the StateCouncil, said that the focus of government should change from GDP growth rate to the quality ofGDP.

"The GDP growth rate is going down as China readjusts economic structure, but we can hedgethe declining pressure by increasing the quality of GDP," Niu said. "If the growth implies moreresponsibilities in redistribution and social assistances, it will help us avoid the middle-incometrap."

Niu and his team developed a system to evaluate China's GDP quality from its contribution toeconomic efficiency, social benefit, environment protection, improvement on people's livelihoodand sustainability of public management.

The quality report was published on Wednesday in Beijing, which showed that China's GDPquality had increased by 46.5 percent from 1993 to 2013.

"The GDP quality of China had seen a faster increase since 2013, and I am expecting it toincrease by 24.2 percent to 33.8 percent till the year 2020," Niu said.