Stabilize the economy and promote reform, and constantly improve the policy toolbox

On July 30th, the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee held a meeting to analyze and study the current economic situation and plan economic work in the second half of the year. What is the current economic situation in China? How to do economic work in the second half of the year? How to push the reform in related fields? On August 1st, the National Development and Reform Commission held a press conference and invited relevant responsible comrades to interpret some hot economic issues.

Facing external pressure, how was the economy in the first half of the year?

Better than expected, high-quality development achieved new results.

"In the first half of the year, China’s economy made steady progress and was better than expected while withstanding external pressure and digesting accumulated risks. New achievements were made in high-quality development and the gold content of development continued to increase." Zhou Chen, director of the National Economic Comprehensive Department of the National Development and Reform Commission, analyzed the characteristics of economic operation in the first half of the year from three aspects.

The main macro indicators performed well. In the first half of the year, the gross domestic product (GDP) increased by 5.3% year-on-year, which was better than the market expectation at the beginning of the year and increased by 0.3 percentage points over the same period last year.

In July, the expected index of production and business activities was 52.6%, which continued to expand on the line of prosperity and decline, indicating that the market confidence of manufacturing enterprises was relatively stable and optimistic. In addition, employment, prices and residents’ income are generally stable. In the first half of the year, the national urban survey unemployment rate averaged 5.2%, down 0.1 percentage point from the first quarter, and 6.95 million new jobs were created in cities and towns, achieving the annual target of 58%.

Economic operation shows strong resilience. In the first half of the year, domestic demand continued to play the main role of growth, contributing 68.8% to economic growth; Foreign trade has shown great resilience, with the scale of import and export standing at 20 trillion yuan, and exports increasing by 7.2%; The role of "ballast stone" in equipment manufacturing continued to play, and the added value of equipment manufacturing increased by 10.2%; The development of modern service industry was accelerated, and the services of information transmission, software and information technology increased by 11.1%.

New kinetic energy accelerates development and growth. Innovative achievements such as open source models of artificial intelligence and innovative drugs are constantly emerging, and emerging industries such as intelligent unmanned aerial vehicle manufacturing and intelligent vehicle equipment manufacturing are thriving. In the first half of the year, the added value of high-tech manufacturing increased by 9.5%, which was 3.1 percentage points faster than that of industries above designated size.

"The economic performance has not come easily this year, which has laid a good foundation for achieving the goals and tasks of economic and social development throughout the year and enhanced our confidence." Chen Zhou introduced the priorities of the National Development and Reform Commission in the next step:

We will continue to exert our efforts and make timely efforts to implement the deployed policy initiatives. Unswervingly implement the strategy of expanding domestic demand, unswervingly promote high-level scientific and technological self-reliance, deepen reform and opening up, and make efforts to build a unified national market. In particular, a number of measures to continue to promote stable employment and stabilize the economy have been introduced and implemented one after another, turning external pressure into endogenous power and stabilizing the economic market.

Strengthen economic monitoring, forecasting and early warning, constantly improve the toolbox of policies to stabilize employment and expand domestic demand, launch it in time according to changes in the external environment, focus on stabilizing employment, enterprises, markets and expectations, and strive to achieve a reasonable rebound in price levels, overall social employment stability and economic growth.

The economy is progressing steadily. What have we done?

Deepen the construction of a unified national market and strengthen the domestic circulation.

At present, external shocks and uncertainties are increasing, and strengthening the domestic cycle has become a strategic move to promote economic stability and long-term success. "It will speed up the cracking of blocking points that restrict the domestic big cycle and consolidate and expand the economic recovery to a good momentum." Chen Zhou said.

-expanding domestic demand in all directions and enhancing the resilience of the domestic macro-cycle.

Promote the "double" construction with high quality. Actively expand effective investment. Study and steadily continue the "two new" policies. Enhance consumption capacity and cultivate new growth points of service consumption.

"It will be submitted for approval to speed up the establishment and launch of new policy financial instruments and promote private enterprises to participate more in the construction of major national projects. At the same time, it will also improve the price formation mechanism in the fields of transportation and energy, and improve the return on investment. " Zhou Chen said.

-Optimize the supply structure and improve the domestic macro-cycle benefits.

Three sets of data show the effectiveness of the unified big market construction: from January to April this year, the national inter-provincial trade sales accounted for 40.4% of the total sales revenue, an increase of 0.6 percentage points over the same period of last year; In the first half of the year, the ratio of total social logistics cost to GDP decreased by 0.1 and 0.2 percentage points respectively compared with the first quarter and the same period of last year, achieving the lowest level since the statistics, saving more than 130 billion yuan in social logistics cost; In the first half of the year, the nationwide inter-provincial transaction power increased by 18.2% year-on-year, accounting for 2.6 percentage points of the market-oriented transaction power … "These data reflect the reduction of market transaction costs and the optimal allocation of factor resources in a wider range." Wang Renfei, director of the Comprehensive Department of System Reform of the National Development and Reform Commission, said.

Chen Zhou said that it is necessary to further promote the construction of a unified national market, and "make efforts to promote the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation. Revitalize the stock and promote the capacity management of key industries. At the same time, adhere to the principle of moderate advancement and not excessive advancement, build and use infrastructure, and give full play to multiple benefits. "

-Strengthen safety capacity building in key areas and enhance the reliability of domestic large-scale circulation.

Consolidate the foundation of food security in an all-round way and implement a new round of 100 billion Jin of grain production capacity improvement action and seed industry revitalization action; Vigorously improve the ability of energy resources security, accelerate the construction of a new energy system, and comprehensively promote the construction of bulk commodity storage and transportation bases; Make every effort to ensure the safety of the supply chain of important industrial chains.

Consolidate the positive momentum, what should we do next?

Standardize the government’s investment behavior and rectify the disorderly competition of enterprises.

Politburo meeting of the Chinese Communist Party stressed that "we must unswervingly deepen reform". Wang Renfei said that in the next step, the National Development and Reform Commission will accelerate the implementation of some landmark reform measures.

-Closely expand domestic demand, stabilize the economy and deepen reform.

Dig deep into the potential to boost consumption, improve the policy system for promoting consumption, and promote the implementation of measures such as promoting service consumption, starting economy and digital consumption. Expand effective investment, improve the system and mechanism of government investment to effectively promote social investment, and amplify the investment multiplier effect. To deepen reform, shape and guide expectations, stimulate the vitality of business entities, and enhance the core competitiveness of state-owned enterprises. Study the policy measures to promote the development of private investment, sum up the experience of introducing private capital in the field of nuclear power, increase the promotion of private capital in the fields of transportation, energy and water conservancy, and promote the development and growth of private economy.

-Deepen reform by closely cracking the outstanding contradictions in economic operation.

Some industries and fields have problems such as "involution", disorderly competition and market disorder. In the next step, we should unify the scale of government behavior, clarify the specific behaviors that are encouraged and prohibited by attracting investment, control and prevent all kinds of behaviors and practices that hinder the unified market and fair competition, and rectify the disorderly competition of enterprises according to laws and regulations.

Jiang Yi, director and spokesperson of the Policy Research Office of the National Development and Reform Commission, told the reporter that the National Development and Reform Commission is working with relevant parties to accelerate the revision of the price law, select industries with more prominent "involution" competition, conduct targeted cost surveys, and urge enterprises to consciously regulate price behavior.

-Deepen reform by closely cultivating new kinetic energy for development.

Optimize the market access environment for new formats and new fields, speed up the formulation of a number of special measures to relax market access, and introduce policy measures to cultivate and open new scenes, so as to promote scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation with scene innovation. At the same time, we will promote the innovative allocation of production factors, promote the comprehensive reform pilot of factor market allocation, deeply explore the realization path of new factors such as data confirmation and participation in distribution, and promote the smooth flow and efficient allocation of various production factors.

Original title: "Stabilizing the economy and promoting reform, and constantly improving the policy toolbox"

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