During the first half of the 13th Five-Year Plan, under the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping as the core and guided by Xi Jinping's Thought on the Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, the business system thoroughly studied and implemented the spirit of the 18th and the 19th CPC National Congress and the previous plenary sessions. We enhanced the four “awarenesses", four “confidences” and two “safeguards", implemented the new development concept and followed the high-quality development requirements. We firmly promoted the implementation of the 13th Five-Year Plan for commercial development by taking the supply-side structural reform as the main line. Various objectives and tasks were progressing smoothly, and the business undertakings achieved new developments, new improvements and new breakthroughs.
1. Lead high-quality commercial development with new development concepts
Adhering to innovative development, the kinetic energy of business development continued to increase. Adhering to coordinated development, the pattern for commercial development continued to be optimized. Adhering to green development, the sustainable development of commerce continued to be improved. Adhering to open development, the convergence of interests with other countries continued to be expanded. Adhering to shared development, the function of the commercial services for people's livelihood continued to be strengthened. In accordance with the strategic plans of the 19th CPC National Congress, we set the goal of striving to build a strong economic and trade power ahead of time, proposed and implemented six major tasks and eight major action plans for commercial reform and development.
2. The main commercial indicators run in line with expectations
Domestic consumption grew steadily. Consumption maintained the first driving force for economic growth. In the first two years, the total retail sales of consumer goods increased by 10.3% on average. In the first half of 2018, the growth rate was 9.4%, and the online retail sales of physical goods increased by about 30%. Foreign trade was stable and upward. The trade in goods fell by 6.8% in 2016, and increased by 11.4% and 15.9% respectively in 2017 and the first half of 2018. The export remained to be the top one in the world, and the import the second. Service trade increased by 3.1% on average in the first two years, and increased by 17% in the first half of 2018, continuing to be the second in the world. The scale of utilizing foreign capital was basically stable. The actual scale of foreign investment absorption ranked second in the world, ranking first in developing countries for 26 consecutive years. In the past two and a half years, the actual absorption of foreign investment was about US$340 billion. Foreign investment cooperation developed in an orderly manner. The scale of foreign direct investment ranked third in the world. In the past two and a half years, the total foreign direct investment reached US$416.9 billion, and the accumulated foreign contracted projects completed a turnover of US$400.8 billion.
3. The efforts to focus on the central task and serve the overall interests were more strengthened.
The first CIIE set a new high-level opening milestone in the new era, and became the home-based diplomatic event which covered the most extensive countries with the largest scale in 2018. A total of 172 countries, regions and international organizations and more than 400 foreign guests either of or above ministerial level participated in the event. It became a world-class exhibition. 3,617 overseas companies participated in it. More than 800,000 people came to negotiate purchase and have visiting experience, with a turnover of US$57.8 billion. A world-class high-level forum was held. More than 4,500 guests gathered in the Hongqiao International Economic and Trade Forum. The Belt and Road economic and trade cooperation achieved remarkable results. The first Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation achieved fruitful economic and trade achievements. In the past two and a half years, the import and export of goods with countries along the Belt and Road routes reached US$2.6 trillion and direct investment reached US$36.6 billion. The Mombasa Port-Nairobi railway and Ababa-Djibouti railway began to operate, and a number of major cooperation projects were successfully implemented and the construction of the Belt and Road free trade network was accelerated. The opening-up layout was optimized to promote coordinated development. We actively supported the expansion of the opening up in Xiongan New Area and the construction of the Greater Bay Area of Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao, promoted the integration of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and Yangtze River Delta markets, and steadily advanced the construction of the border economic cooperation zones and the cross-border economic cooperation zones. Poverty alleviation through commerce functioned and shared the development. The rural e-commerce comprehensive pilot program supported 737 state-level poverty-stricken counties. The program of alleviating poverty through housekeeping, covering more than 100 cities and 10,000 villages increased the employment by creating jobs for 100,000 people, and the number of foreign laborers in the program of alleviating poverty through foreign labor reached 35,000. The 122nd and 123rd Canton Fairs reduced the booth fee by more than 30 million yuan for the companies in the poor areas.
4.The new open economy system has been gradually improved
Fruitful results have been achieved in the innovation of the pilot free trade zone system. We have established 7 pilot free trade zones such as Liaoning and Hainan Free Trade Zones, and replicated and promoted 153 pieces of experience in pilot reforms. Plan 3.0 of Shanghai Free Trade Zone and Plan 2.0 of Guangdong, Tianjin and Fujian Free Trade Zones were launched. We have granted greater autonomy to reform and carries out some measures to support pilot free trade zones to deepen reform and innovation. The study of free trade ports has been pushed forward. More efforts have been made in reforming the commercial system and mechanism. We have the foreign trade policy framework suitable for the development of new business modes such as cross-border e-commerce, and fully implemented the pre-establishment national treatment and negative list management system for foreign investment. The filing and business registration of establishing foreign-invested enterprises were “handled at one window”, and the new management model of “filing first, approval second” for outward investment was implemented.
5. Innovating circulation and expanding consumption have achieved remarkable results
The modernization of circulation has been continuously improved. The national agricultural product circulation backbone network has been basically formed. 25 provinces issued documents to rescind local policies that restrict the sales of non-local second-hand vehicles, and the supply chain innovation and application pilots were started. The urban and rural distribution network continued to be improved. In the past two and a half years, the proportion of the total social logistics cost in GDP decreased by 1.5 percentage points. The cultivation of high-end, mid-end and green consumption was accelerated. The renovation and upgrading of pedestrian streets in key cities were officially launched, and consumer facilities such as urban and rural convenience consumption and service centers continued to be improved. The supply of quality goods and services increased, the sharing economy and service consumption have become new growth drivers, the promotion of green shopping malls and green catering was accelerated, and the business credit system has been continuously improved.
6. The new advantages of foreign trade competition have been rapidly cultivated.
The driving force transformation and structural adjustment in foreign trade have continued to be deepened. The “five optimizations” of international market layout, domestic regional layout, commodity structure, business entities and trade modes have been actively promoted. The “three constructions” of foreign trade transformation and upgrading bases, trade promotion platforms and international marketing service networks have continued to be accelerated, new business and new modes like cross-border e-commerce have become the highlights and the level of trade facilitation has been continuously improved. Trade in services achieved innovative development. The pilots for innovation and development in service trade have been deepened, and the construction of service outsourcing demonstration cities has been actively promoted, and culture, traditional Chinese medicine, and Chinese food have speeded up going global.
7. The quality and benefits of two-way investment have been significantly improved.The level of utilizing foreign capital continued to be enhanced. The negative lists for foreign investment access of the whole country and pilot free trade zones were released, market access for foreign investment was greatly expanded, and the investment environment was significantly improved. Beijing service industry expanded and opened up comprehensive pilots and formed 68 innovation outcomes, the national economic development zone sped up innovation and improvement and China-foreign cooperative parks have become new open platforms. Foreign investment has developed steadily and orderly. Twenty confirmed and evaluated overseas economic and trade cooperation zones have invested more than 20 billion US dollars. The green-field investment, merge and acquisition, and joint investment were thriving. The international production capacity cooperation continued to be deepened and irrational investment has been effectively curbed.
8. The international economic and trade relations of win-win cooperation have been deepened.
We participated more actively in formulating international economic and trade rules. The influence of the Beijing APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting continued to expand, which advanced a number of economic and trade achievements from the G20 Hangzhou Summit, the BRICS Xiamen Summit, the SCO Qingdao Summit, and the Beijing Summit of Forum on China-Africa Cooperation. We have firmly supported the multilateral trade system, released the white paper of China and the World Trade Organization for the first time, and issued China’s Position Paper on the WTO Reforms. . The free trade zones construction has been accelerated. We signed free trade agreements with Georgia and Maldives, reached a free trade agreement with Mauritius, and reached 17 free trade agreements with 25 countries and regions till now. Bilateral regional economic and trade relations have become closer. We have promoted economic and trade cooperation with the United States, conducted close China-EU and China-Russia economic and trade cooperation, resumed China-Japan high-level economic dialogues, further advanced regional and sub-regional cooperation such as the "10+1" and "16+1" cooperation and deepened economic and trade cooperation with Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. At the same time, measures on foreign aid were implemented, and the Institute of South-South Cooperation and Development and the South-South Cooperation Assistance Fund were successfully established. We have carried out trade relief and export control orderly and firmly safeguarded national economic security.
