China will enhance support to those living in poverty, living on minimum subsistence allowances or unemployed, and ramp up financial services for micro and small firms, according to a statement released after a State Council executive meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang.

Facing unprecedented challenges in economic development, the meeting on Tuesday noted that more targeted measures must be taken to guarantee people's basic livelihoods.

The meeting noted that poor laborers should get priority to be hired in construction of major national projects, aid should be arranged for people in temporary trouble caused by the pandemic, and the coverage of unemployment insurance should be further expanded.

It was also decided at the meeting to release more credit resources and improve the ability to serve small and micro businesses.

Moreover, three months of rent will be exempted in the first half of the year for small and micro enterprises and individual business in the service industry that lease state-owned houses.

China's economy is expected to recover in the second quarter after shrinking in the first quarter amid the COVID-19 pandemic,  experts said Tuesday. 

China's gross domestic product (GDP) contracted 6.8 percent year on year in the first quarter amid the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, according to data released by China's National Bureau of Statistics.