(Economic Observation) How will China start to stabilize foreign trade and foreign investment in the second half of the year? Ministry of Commerce revealed three signals
China News Service, Beijing, August 9th. Title: How will China stabilize foreign trade and foreign investment in the second half of the year? Ministry of Commerce revealed three signals
China News Agency reporter Li Xiaoyu
Under the epidemic situation, although China's overall performance in foreign trade and foreign investment has been outstanding, there are still many "immediate worries" and "foresight". Chinese Minister of Commerce Zhong Shan recently accepted a media interview and revealed the major directions for China to stabilize foreign trade and foreign investment in the second half of the year.
Deepen "One Belt One Road" economic and trade cooperation
At present, China's foreign trade is gradually stabilizing. According to official data, China's exports in July increased by 10.4% year-on-year, and the growth rate hit a 17-month high. From January to July, China's total import and export value fell by 1.7% year-on-year, and the rate of decline narrowed by 1.5 percentage points from the first half of the year.
However, Zhong Shan pointed out that in the second half of the year, the situation facing China’s foreign trade is more complex and severe. The impact of the global economic downturn on demand will become more apparent, the supply chain of the industrial chain will be blocked, the trend of protectionism and anti-globalization will continue to rise, and foreign trade companies will still be under pressure to survive. Big.
He said that stabilizing foreign trade requires not only to consolidate traditional markets, but also to explore emerging markets and deepen economic and trade cooperation along the “Belt and Road” initiative.
Since the outbreak of the epidemic, economic and trade cooperation between China and countries along the “Belt and Road” has become closer. According to official data, China’s imports and exports to countries along the “Belt and Road” route amounted to 4.2 trillion yuan (RMB, the same below) in the first half of this year, a slight decrease of 0.9% year-on-year, which is 2.3 percentage points lower than the overall rate. Among them, the trade volume between China and ASEAN bucked the trend and increased by 5.6% year-on-year, and ASEAN continued to be China's largest trading partner. During the same period, China's non-financial direct investment in countries along the “Belt and Road” also grew by 19.4% year-on-year.
Introduced a negative list of cross-border service trade
Currently, service trade is becoming a new bright spot in China's stable foreign trade. According to official data, the decline in China's service exports in the first half of the year has stabilized, driving the service trade deficit to drop by 46.1% to 40.71 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 34.04 billion yuan; knowledge-intensive service imports and exports accounted for 43.7% of total service imports and exports, an increase of 9.6 Percentage points.
However, considering that the epidemic is still spreading, the world economy is in serious recession, and international demand has shrunk sharply, China's service trade development will face a severe situation in the future.
Under such circumstances, accelerating the promotion of high-quality development of service trade will become one of China's key tasks in stabilizing foreign trade in the second half of the year. The recent executive meeting of the State Council specifically mentioned that trade in services should play a role in stabilizing foreign trade and foreign investment. Zhong Shan revealed that a negative list of cross-border trade in services will be issued in the second half of the year.
Li Jun, director of the Service Trade Research Institute of the Institute of International Trade and Economic Cooperation of the Ministry of Commerce, said in an interview with a reporter from China News Agency that China's current vigorous development of service trade is also related to the international environment such as rising protectionism and increasing trade frictions. These external pressures act more in the field of trade in goods. In terms of trade in services, developed countries still have a strong willingness to cooperate with China. Under such circumstances, starting with service trade to stabilize foreign trade will help create more cooperation opportunities and stimulate cooperation potential.
Revise the catalog of industries that encourage foreign investment
Speaking of the situation of attracting foreign investment, Zhong Shan said frankly that under the impact of the epidemic, global cross-border investment has shrunk sharply. Some countries have encouraged industries to return, and international competition for investment has intensified. The pressure on China's industry to transfer abroad has increased and the use of foreign investment has become more difficult.
He said that in the second half of the year, the focus will be on stabilizing the stock of foreign capital, expanding the increase in foreign capital, and maintaining the status of a major country in the use of foreign capital. China will revise the catalog of industries that encourage foreign investment and encourage more foreign businessmen to invest in the central and western regions and old industrial bases in the northeast.
The Catalog of Industries Encouraging Foreign Investment is an important policy document that clarifies the industries, fields and regions that China encourages foreign investment. It has been revised 8 times since the first edition in 1995. In June last year, China’s published encouraging catalogue included two parts, the national catalogue and the central and western region catalogue, with 415 and 693 entries respectively.
Zong Changqing, Director of the Foreign Investment Department of the Ministry of Commerce, previously stated that the revised catalogue will encourage foreign businessmen to invest in domestic industrial chains and supply chains that have shortcomings, and promote the gradual transfer of foreign investment in China that is affected by rising costs in the eastern region. The ability of the central and western regions and northeast regions to undertake industrial transfer. (Finish)