Maintaining stability and improving quality to stimulate new kinetic energy of foreign trade
In the first three quarters of this year, China’s total import and export value was 31.11 trillion yuan, an increase of 9.9% over the same period last year. Facing the complicated and severe domestic and international situation and the impact of multiple unexpected factors, China’s foreign trade once again shows strong resilience and vitality. Recently, the implementation effect of various economic stabilization policies has gradually emerged, which will further promote the steady growth of foreign trade.
The policy of stabilizing foreign trade has achieved good results
Since the beginning of this year, the CPC Central Committee and the State Council have made timely arrangements to create favorable conditions for the goal of maintaining stability and improving quality in foreign trade. A series of policies and measures to stabilize the economy and foreign trade have achieved good results. The steady growth of foreign trade in the first three quarters has also made positive contributions to the sustained and stable development of China’s macro-economy.
The data shows that the net export of goods and services contributed 32% to economic growth in the first three quarters, driving GDP growth by 1 percentage point. Ni Yueju, a researcher at the Institute of World Economics and Politics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, believes that such achievements in foreign trade are mainly due to high-quality development and high-level opening up.
Affected by geopolitical conflicts, COVID-19 epidemic and high inflation in major western countries, the growth rate of global trade in goods slowed down in the second quarter of this year. "Although China’s foreign trade has been affected to some extent, it still maintains a steady growth trend and shows strong resilience." Zhu Caihua, a professor at the Institute of International Economics of the University of International Business and Economics, said.
The high-quality development of foreign trade has achieved remarkable results, and the competitiveness of high value-added and high-tech products is constantly emerging. In the first three quarters, the export of mechanical and electrical products was 10.04 trillion yuan, up 10%, accounting for 56.8% of the total export value. "Automobile exports have sprung up, with a growth rate of 67.1%, and the export of new energy vehicles has more than doubled." Ni Yueju said that the automobile industry is an intermediate industry to promote the development of high technology in the world, and automobile products are a platform for carrying and applying various high technologies. "The rapid growth of automobile exports shows that the overall international competitiveness of China’s manufacturing industry has increased."
At the same time, the high-level opening-up policy has achieved remarkable results. ASEAN continues to be China’s largest trading partner. In the first three quarters, the total trade value between China and ASEAN was 4.7 trillion yuan, an increase of 15.2%. "China has strong resilience in the industrial chain supply chain, especially the high-quality implementation of RCEP has enhanced the stability of the regional industrial chain supply chain." Yan Caihua said. In addition, in the first three quarters, the proportion of trade between China and countries along the Belt and Road has risen to 32.3%, and the diversified development of the international market has achieved positive results. "This is also a key factor to support the stable development of foreign trade in the future." Ni Yueju said.
Cross-border e-commerce still has potential to be tapped.
Cross-border e-commerce and other new formats and new models are the effective force of foreign trade development and an important trend of international trade development.
Since the beginning of this year, new foreign trade formats and new models such as cross-border e-commerce have developed steadily. In the first three quarters, Zhejiang enterprises exported 79.3 billion yuan through the customs cross-border e-commerce management platform, an increase of 1.5 times; The import and export of Jiangxi enterprises through the customs cross-border e-commerce management platform increased by 2.4 times year-on-year; On the basis of exceeding 300 billion yuan, the total import and export volume of cross-border e-commerce in Guangdong has achieved full coverage in the province, ranking first in the country.
In the first three quarters, the total export volume of Jiangxi Haitao cross-border e-commerce industrial park in Jiangxi Jiujiang Economic Development Zone exceeded last year. Zhu Cheng, chairman of Jiangxi Bichuang cross-border electronic commerce Co., Ltd., said that cross-border e-commerce is welcoming unprecedented development opportunities. In addition to the rapid growth of mature consumer markets such as Europe and the United States, markets such as Southeast Asia, South America and the Middle East are rising rapidly. "In particular, the implementation of RCEP has brought new momentum to the development of cross-border e-commerce".
"Cross-border e-commerce is not only a new format and new model for foreign trade development, but also a new kinetic energy for stabilizing foreign trade. After more than 10 years of development, there is still potential to be tapped in the future. " Yan Caihua said. At the international level, it is necessary to strengthen cooperation with relevant countries in the field of e-commerce. At present, China has signed memorandums of understanding with 16 countries on "Digital Silk Road" cooperation, and established bilateral cooperation mechanisms for "Silk Road E-commerce" with 24 countries, China — Central and Eastern European countries, China — Positive progress has been made in the construction of e-commerce cooperation and dialogue mechanisms among the five Central Asian countries. At the national level, it is necessary to continue to push the customs, taxation, finance and other departments to deepen the reform of the system and mechanism, innovate the supervision mode, and provide more reform dividends for the convenient development of cross-border e-commerce. At the enterprise level, we should actively use new technologies and invest in new models, especially to increase the investment and construction of "overseas warehouses" and accelerate the digital transformation of enterprises.
At present, the slowdown of external demand growth has become the biggest uncertainty facing the development of foreign trade. Ni Yueju said that if cross-border e-commerce companies want to gain a foothold in the increasingly competitive international market, they must "deeply cultivate" brands and channels. Brand power has become the core competitiveness of cross-border e-commerce sellers in the future, and brands are based on high-quality products. Therefore, higher quality and more integrity are the magic weapons for cross-border e-commerce.
It is understood that in order to give full play to the potential of cross-border e-commerce, the 132nd Canton Fair continues to carry out synchronous activities with 132 cross-border e-commerce comprehensive experimental zones and 5 cross-border e-commerce platforms, and provides services such as freight forwarding, finance and credit insurance online. "We will continue to guide various cross-border e-commerce comprehensive experimental zones, cultivate a number of key enterprises and well-known brands, and fully tap the advantages and potential of cross-border e-commerce." Wang Shouwen, international trade negotiator and vice minister of the Ministry of Commerce, said.
The effect of afterloading on uncertainty
At present, the uncertainty faced by foreign trade is increasing, and the pressure to maintain steady growth of imports and exports is increasing. It is still necessary to further increase efficiency and stabilize foreign trade growth through policy measures.
"It is necessary to ensure that the stable foreign trade policy that has been introduced will be effective as soon as possible, support foreign trade enterprises to ensure production and compliance, smooth the channels for foreign trade enterprises to seize orders, and cultivate new modes and new growth points of foreign trade." Liu Jianying, an associate researcher at the Foreign Trade Research Institute of the Ministry of Commerce, said.
Keeping the main body of foreign trade market is one of the most urgent tasks to stabilize foreign trade. Ni Yueju said: "We should take grasping orders as the starting point of protecting the main body and help foreign trade enterprises, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, tide over the difficulties."
Report to the 20th CPC National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed to promote the optimization and upgrading of trade in goods, innovate the development mechanism of service trade, develop digital trade, and accelerate the construction of a trade power. Zhao Ping, vice president of the Research Institute of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, believes that accelerating the construction of a strong trading country should continue to exert its strength in three aspects: First, the international competitiveness of trading partners is stronger; Second, the development of trade entities is more resilient; Third, the international discourse power of trade rules is stronger.
Experts said that in recent years, China’s foreign trade import and export structure has changed from labor-intensive products to high-tech value-added products. In the future, under the strategy of innovation-driven development, we will continue to enhance the capability of independent innovation, shape new kinetic energy and advantages of foreign trade development, optimize the structure of trade in goods, improve the level of trade digitalization, promote the integration of domestic and foreign trade, and promote the coordinated development of trade in goods and services. At the same time, by promoting high-level opening to the outside world and steadily expanding institutional opening such as rules, regulations, management and standards, more opportunities will be created for enterprises all over the world.