As an important part of the "six stabilities", stabilizing foreign trade has become one of the focuses of the two sessions this year. The government work report is clear and promotes the basic stability of foreign trade. Focusing on supporting enterprises to increase orders, stabilize jobs and ensure employment, increase credit supply, expand the coverage of export credit insurance, reduce the cost of import and export compliance, and support export products to domestic sales.
Delegates and industry experts interviewed by the Economic Information Daily pointed out that these policy arrangements involve many departments and fields, which means that the policy combination boxing will make further efforts to promote the development of new foreign trade formats and new models on the premise of protecting the main body of foreign trade market, helping enterprises to explore diversified international and domestic markets and providing more powerful support and confidence for stabilizing foreign trade.
Guaranteed enterprises get multi-party policy support.
According to the deployment of the government work report, supporting enterprises to increase orders, stabilize jobs and ensure employment has become an important force to stabilize foreign trade. Zhong Shan, Minister of Commerce, said at the "Ministerial Channel" interview on the 25th that the most important thing to stabilize foreign trade is to stabilize the main body of foreign trade. At present, there are more than 400,000 foreign trade entities in China, including private enterprises, state-owned enterprises and foreign-funded enterprises. Faced with the impact of the epidemic, these enterprises have encountered unprecedented difficulties.
In Zhongshan’s view, some enterprises can solve these difficulties through their own efforts, and some need government help. "The CPC Central Committee and the State Council attached great importance to it, and provided policy assistance and support from the aspects of finance and taxation, finance and insurance, industrial chain and supply chain, which reduced the pressure on enterprises and stimulated their vitality."
The support policy is still overweight. Sun Guojun, a member of the drafting group of the government work report and a member of the Party Group of the Research Office of the State Council, said at the briefing of the State Council Office on the 22nd that it is necessary to promote the diversification of export entities and promote the support policies such as finance and insurance to cover more small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprises.
A few days ago, the Ministry of Commerce said that it will actively guide foreign trade enterprises, especially small and medium-sized micro-foreign trade enterprises, to make full use of export credit insurance policies with local commercial authorities and China Export Credit Insurance Corporation. Give full play to the role of financial funds, strengthen the cooperation of "government+bank+insurance", expand the scale of policy financing, and help small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprises obtain bank financial support through credit insurance and credit enhancement.
"As the foundation and implementation subject of China’s foreign trade, small and micro export enterprises have encountered unprecedented challenges and need all-round help." The relevant person in charge of China Credit Insurance told reporters that CITIC Insurance Company will appropriately increase the risk tolerance, reduce the premium rate, optimize the claims service and reduce the financial losses of small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprises according to the principle of marketization.
Hu Xiaolian, member of the Standing Committee of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and Chairman of The Export-Import Bank of China, said that in the past few months, The Export-Import Bank of China has been providing financial services to foreign trade enterprises. She also pointed out that according to the specific stage faced by foreign trade enterprises, corresponding support will be provided to help enterprises resume work and production.
Stabilize the market and actively explore domestic and foreign markets
Facing the severe foreign trade situation, the state is still actively promoting enterprises to explore domestic and foreign markets. Sun Guojun said that in stabilizing foreign trade, it is necessary to promote the diversification of the international market. He specifically mentioned that China’s exports to countries along the "Belt and Road" have reached 30%, which has become an important new growth point of foreign trade.
According to the data of the General Administration of Customs, in the first four months, China’s total import and export volume decreased by 4.9%, but the trade of countries along the Belt and Road increased against the trend, accounting for 1.7 percentage points to 30.4%.
Gao Feng, spokesman of the Ministry of Commerce, said a few days ago that in the next step, we will continue to strengthen cooperation with countries related to the Belt and Road Initiative, consolidate the good momentum of economic and trade development, further enhance the level of facilitation, and promote the steady and healthy development of economic and trade cooperation.
Enterprises exploring the domestic market are also welcoming more policy support. The government work report clearly stated that export products should be supported for domestic sales. The report on the draft national economic and social development plan also makes arrangements to support and encourage export enterprises to actively explore the domestic market, guide enterprises to export to domestic sales, and actively hedge the impact of shrinking external demand.
In fact, some enterprises have begun to explore. "Overseas demand is affected by the epidemic and the export environment is grim. However, thanks to the resumption of major national projects, major projects were implemented ahead of schedule, and some building materials were in good demand. " Xia Wenyong, deputy to the National People’s Congress, secretary of the Party Committee and chairman of Xinyu Iron and Steel Group Co., Ltd., pointed out in an interview with the Economic Information Daily that this has further strengthened the determination of enterprises to explore the domestic market.
However, some interviewed enterprises and chambers of commerce pointed out that foreign trade enterprises are facing many difficulties and challenges because of the lack of relevant experience and channels. In this regard, the Ministry of Commerce said that in order to help enterprises explore domestic sales channels and reduce domestic sales costs, it is working with relevant departments to study support programs, promote the implementation of national deployment, and levy import link taxes according to regulations when processing trade bonded materials or finished products enter the domestic market for sale, but temporarily exempt from deferred tax interest until the end of the year, and expand the pilot of selective taxation for domestic sales.
Seek development, promote foreign trade stability and improve quality
On the basis of stabilizing the basic foreign trade, how to promote the stability and quality of foreign trade has also become the focus of the two sessions. The government work report proposes to accelerate the development of new formats such as cross-border e-commerce and enhance international freight capacity. Promote a new round of pilot innovation and development of service trade. Organize the third China International Import Expo(CIIE), actively expand imports and develop a higher level of big market facing the world.
Zhu Caihua, deputy director of the Foreign Trade Research Institute of the Institute of International Trade and Economic Cooperation of the Ministry of Commerce, told the Economic Information Daily that while adopting multi-channel and multi-faceted relief policies, it is more important to guide enterprises to change their thinking and turn crises into opportunities. "The epidemic has brought great pressure to China enterprises, but the pressure can also make enterprises out of the comfort zone, and’ squeeze out’ a number of stronger foreign trade enterprises in China through the thinking of’ looking forward’ and relying on technology, mode, format and management innovation to promote the high-quality development of foreign trade." Yan Caihua said.
Xia Wenyong pointed out that in addition to improving product quality, we should also vigorously practice the national requirements for innovation of new foreign trade formats and new models, so as to broaden the market and contribute to China’s foreign trade development.
At the same time of policy support, market players are constantly enhancing their endogenous development capabilities, which also provides more support and confidence for China’s stable foreign trade. "China is the world’s largest trader of goods. The next goal is to upgrade from a trading power to a trading power. " Zhang Zhanbin, member of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and dean of the Marxist College of the Party School of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (National School of Administration), told the Economic Information Daily that to stabilize foreign trade, we must follow the new requirements of high-quality development, take the supply-side structural reform as the main line, take new measures, help enterprises explore diversified markets, support enterprises to actively expand imports, develop together in various trade modes, accelerate the cultivation of new foreign trade formats, promote the innovative development of service trade, continuously optimize the business environment of enterprises, and create a new situation in foreign trade development.
