China's Premier Li Qiang struck a confident tone about expansion in the world's second largest economy on Tuesday, saying growth in the second quarter will be higher than in the first three months of the year.

"We are on track to achieve the 5% annual growth target that we set earlier this year," he told delegates at a World Economic Forum summit in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin.

"We are fully confident and have the ability to promote the high quality development track of China's economy over a long period of time."

This is a developing story and will be updated.