(Economic Observation) Why is China promoting consumption online?
China News Service, Beijing, September 10 (Reporter Li Xiaoyu) As the peak season for traditional consumption has arrived, China has made new moves to boost consumption.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang chaired an executive meeting of the State Council on the 9th to deploy a package of measures to promote new consumption.
The meeting proposed to promote online open courses, Internet diagnosis and treatment and other services; promote online and offline integration of fitness and tourism; explore new retail such as smart supermarkets.
In addition, it is necessary to promote 5G networks, Internet of Things, etc. to give priority to covering core business districts, industrial parks, and transportation hubs to build gigabit cities.
The reason why China is pushing for new types of consumption is to resist downward pressure and stabilize economic growth.
In the past five years, the contribution rate of consumption to China's economy has remained at around 60%.
With the world economy falling into an unprecedented downturn and increasing uncertainty in the external environment, China now needs more than ever to stabilize growth through domestic demand, especially consumption.
Zhao Ping, vice president of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade Research Institute, said that stable growth now depends more on consumption.
"Consumption is the final demand, and investment is the intermediate demand. Investment growth must be commensurate with consumption growth in order to improve the quality and level of supply and achieve both industrial and consumption upgrades."
Affected by the epidemic, traditional consumption has been "outside the door", while new types of consumption such as online shopping, online education, and online medical services have surged in popularity.
According to official data, while the total retail sales of consumer goods in the first seven months of this year shrank by nearly 10% year-on-year, online retail sales have bucked the trend and increased by 9.0%.
Among them, the growth rate of online retail sales of physical goods reached 15.7%, accounting for a quarter of the total retail sales of consumer goods.
Zhao Ping said that the new type of consumption has become a powerful engine to promote consumption growth, not only with a fast growth rate and a high proportion, but also a strong driving force.
Supporting the development of new types of consumption is conducive to promoting a recovery in consumption and better playing the role of consumption in stabilizing economic growth.
In the medium and long term, this is also the need for China to build a new development pattern with domestic and international cycles as the main body and mutual promotion of domestic and international cycles.
Zang Yueru, director of the Market and Price Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Macroeconomics, said that the demand structure and the upgrading of consumption quality are important driving forces that drive the virtuous cycle of the national economy and accelerate the domestic and international double cycles.
Leading new supplies and shaping new markets through green, safe, and high-quality new consumption, to better meet existing demands and innovate demands, and fully reflect the "ballast stone" effect of consumption on the sustainable and healthy development of the economy.
The key areas supported by the executive meeting of the State Council are all rising against the trend in the epidemic, and there are still many potential "sunrise industries" in the future.
For example, online education has now become the development direction of the global education community.
The just-concluded 2020 China International Trade in Services Fair has set up a special education exhibition for the first time, with more than 120 exhibiting companies, of which the main force is online education companies.
Analysts believe that grasping these key areas and exerting efforts will have a "four-two-two-for-all" effect on promoting consumption.
At the same time, the executive meeting also deployed a series of measures to improve the "hard facilities" and "soft environment" for new types of consumption.
Such as speeding up the construction of new consumer infrastructure, accelerating the digital upgrade of rural business circulation, promoting the construction and sharing of terminals such as smart express boxes; improving mechanisms for user rights protection and product traceability, and cracking down on infringements, counterfeiting, fraud, and privacy leaks in accordance with the law to create peace of mind An honest consumer environment.
A report issued by the China Consumers Association previously showed that online shopping in the first half of this year caused a lot of consumer disputes. For example, some online shopping products are of poor quality and there are safety risks; online customer service of some e-commerce platforms cannot follow up on consumer demands in time, and logistics and distribution are not standardized. .
There are also frequent chaos in areas such as live streaming, online video, and online training services.
Under this circumstance, the requirement of this meeting to improve mechanisms for protecting user rights and interests is undoubtedly "prescribe the right medicine", which will enable consumers to dare to consume and be willing to consume, and help the steady and healthy development of new types of consumption.
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