BEIJING - Leading scholars from the US Columbia University have clearly expressed their optimism about China's ability to achieve its economic target for 2016.

Marcos Troyjo，Director of the BRICLab and Jan Svejnar, economics professor, of the university, made this during their exclusive interviews with Xinhuanet recently.

They believe that China's growth target of 6.5-7 percent of the year is realistic and achievable, especially because China has been very successful in re-balancing its economy.

"It[China] avoided the Asian crisis in the second half of the 1990s, it avoided the great recession that affected most of the world during the last decade, and it has the potential reserves in terms of improving efficiency," Jan Svejnar said.

Based on the facts, China should be able to grow at about 6.5 percent, maybe even 7 percent, in the current year, and even the next several years, Jan Svejnar said.

While cautioning about possible external factors standing in the way, Jan Svejnar persisted that the goal is still realistic to achieve considering the overall conditions.

Meanwhile, Macros Troyjo stressed that China is becoming a big player in foreign markets, not only as a source of exports, but also as a source of foreign direct investment.

This adds to the complexity of China's economic structure and will keep expansion rate at a very high level, he commented.

Macros Troyjo complimented on China's trajectory towards becoming the second largest economy in the world, being particularly impressed by the expansion of China's investment in research and innovation.

"I remember when I worked in diplomacy twenty five years ago, only about 0.5 percent of China's GDP was going to research and development. Now it's nearly two percent," said Macros Troyjo.

China has been investing a lot in areas like solar energy, wind energy, robotics, fine chemistry, Nano technology, which make for the platform of the fourth industrial revolution, according to Macros Troyjo.

"If China is competitive and successful with those, China will take another major leap forward and become an innovation-driven economy," he stressed.

Macros Troyjo also highlighted that managing the transition from a low-cost and export-oriented economy to one that is more tech-intensive and also focused on the domestic market is a big challenge.

And it takes time, energy and resources, particularly to cultivate more talents in the technologically intensive areas, he added.

"But I think China is doing its homework right. I think it's managing quite exceptionally this transition from a low-cost country to becoming a nation that actually creates incremental contribution to value addition", said Macros Troyjo, citing China's leading position in the world in research and investment in solar energy.

The two scholars were in Beijing to attend a high-level roundtable conference on the Role of the State in Economic Growth as part of the Columbia University President's Global Innovation Fund, in collaboration with the Columbia SIPA, Columbia Global Centers of Beijing, Initiative for Policy Dialogue, and Tsinghua University.