General

Against the background of global cross-border investment under pressure, China's foreign investment cooperation has maintained a reasonable and orderly growth trend. Will this trend continue in the future? What growth points will there be?

In this regard, Lv Yue, a professor at the National (Beijing) Institute for Opening up of the University of International Business and Economics, made an analysis:

In terms of investment scale, we are cautiously optimistic. China's determination to open to the outside world has not changed. As more Chinese enterprises explore and participate in global industrial chain supply chain cooperation, foreign investment and cooperation may continue to increase. However, the new crown pneumonia epidemic and the conflict between Russia and Ukraine have made Chinese companies face many challenges in "going out".

In terms of investment methods, on the one hand, with the new round of industrial digital transformation triggered by the new crown pneumonia epidemic, medical and life sciences and other fields may continue to lead Chinese enterprises to invest overseas, and investment methods will show a trend of technology, diversification and cross-domain On the other hand, countries will focus on promoting green growth, and addressing climate change has become an international consensus. Investments related to green and sustainable development will gradually increase, and green infrastructure, green energy, green transportation, and green finance will become the focus of international investment cooperation. Important direction and content.

In terms of regional distribution, this year, China has continued to actively promote high-quality joint construction of the “Belt and Road”, and investment cooperation between China and countries along the “Belt and Road” will remain active. At the same time, under the RCEP framework, investment among member countries is also expected to drive domestic foreign direct investment in Southeast Asia and countries along the “Belt and Road”.

According to data released by the Ministry of Commerce, from January to May, China's foreign non-financial direct investment was 287.06 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 2.3% (equivalent to 44.6 billion US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 3%). Among them, the investment in the wholesale and retail industry was 8.08 billion US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 20.8%; the investment in the construction industry, scientific research and technical services also showed a growth trend. During the same period, the turnover of foreign contracted projects was 344.34 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 0.5%; the newly signed contract value was 507.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 5.4%.

This set of data is the best portrayal of the development trend of China's foreign investment and cooperation. Lu Yue said, first of all, from the perspective of investment scale, since the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, it has been trapped in multiple problems such as supply chain crisis, energy crisis and food crisis, and global trade and investment activities have been impacted. However, China's foreign investment cooperation has grown against the trend. Maintained steady and healthy development. Secondly, from the perspective of regional distribution, non-financial direct investment in countries along the “Belt and Road” continued to maintain high growth, and the investment showed a trend of increasing both in scale and proportion. The completed turnover and newly signed contracts of the countries along the “Belt and Road” also maintain a high proportion, indicating that driving the development of the “Belt and Road” region is still the main line of China’s overseas investment. From the perspective of investment structure, outbound investment in construction, scientific research and technical services is on the rise, indicating that China's outbound investment structure compared with manufacturing, transportation, wholesale and retail as the main target industries in the past. more diversified.

According to data from the Ministry of Commerce, from January to May, China's non-financial direct investment in countries along the "Belt and Road" reached US$8.19 billion, a year-on-year increase of 10.2%, accounting for 18.4% of the total during the same period, an increase of 1.2 percentage points from the same period of the previous year. The turnover of contracted projects in countries along the “Belt and Road” was US$28.55 billion, and the value of newly signed contracts was US$38 billion, accounting for 53.4% and 48.2% of the total respectively.

"According to the data, in the first five months, my country's non-financial direct investment in countries along the 'Belt and Road' increased rapidly, and foreign contracted projects progressed steadily, indicating that my country's globalization layout is still accelerating. The status of foreign investment has further increased.” Lv Yue believes that this is mainly due to two reasons: First, most of the countries along the “Belt and Road” are developing countries and emerging economies, and they are in the social security housing and other livelihood projects. There is a strong demand for funds in public health areas such as medical facilities and medical facilities, as well as in infrastructure areas such as industrialization and new infrastructure. Second, the implementation of RCEP has driven the growth of China's investment in countries along the "Belt and Road". Most of the RCEP members are countries along the "Belt and Road", and the implementation of RCEP will play an important role in promoting the joint construction of the "Belt and Road".