General

Looking back over the past year, China's foreign trade has been impacted by multiple unexpected factors, and its development is still magnificent - the import and export scale of international trade has broken through the threshold of 40 trillion yuan for the first time, hitting a new record high, and making positive contributions to the steady development of the economy.

2023 is the first year to fully implement the spirit of the 20th CPC National Congress and the key year to implement the "14th Five-Year Plan". At present, there are still uncertainties affecting global trade. Therefore, the Central Economic Work Conference in 2022 proposed to make greater efforts to promote the stability of foreign trade scale and the optimization of the structure.

In the new year, how will all regions promote the stability and quality of foreign trade? What are the new blueprints? When sorting out the recently held two sessions and their government work reports, the reporter noted that stabilizing the scale and optimizing the structure are the consistent focus of foreign trade work in all regions this year, and that overseas order grabbing, cross-border e-commerce, open platforms and so on have become high-frequency words. All localities have also made every effort to expand the international trade market, smooth the channel and increase confidence, so as to make every effort to turn the "planning map" into the "construction drawing".

Make every effort to stabilize the scale

In 2022, Guangdong's total import and export value reached a new record on the basis of the high base of the previous year, accounting for 19.8% of the total import and export value of the country; The total import and export value of Jiangsu's foreign trade is 5.45 trillion yuan, and the scale has also reached a new record; Zhejiang's import and export volume reached 4.68 trillion yuan, an increase of 13.1% over 2021; The total import and export value of Shandong's foreign trade was 3.33 trillion yuan, up 13.8% year on year; Fujian's import and export of goods reached a record high of 1.98 trillion yuan; The import and export of goods in Shanghai reached 4.19 trillion yuan, up 3.2% year-on-year

Looking at the 2022 foreign trade transcripts of various regions, the above-mentioned major foreign trade provinces have played a prominent role as "pillars" and played a leading role in promoting the stability of the overall market, expanding advantages and increasing vitality of foreign trade.

In the new year, how can all regions continue the good momentum and promote the stability and quality of foreign trade? From the work reports of local governments, although the external situation is still grim, the confidence of local governments in the stable scale of foreign trade in 2023 remains unchanged.

Multiple targets have been set: Zhejiang proposes to ensure that the share of exports in the country will remain at about 14.5% by 2023, Fujian proposes an expected target of export growth of 7% by 2023, Yunnan proposes a target of total import and export growth of about 15%, Hunan aims to increase the total import and export by 10%, Guangxi aims to increase the total import and export by more than 7%, and Shaanxi aims to increase the total import and export by more than 6%, Liaoning's goal is to increase its total import and export volume by about 6%.

With the further optimization and adjustment of the epidemic prevention and control policy, at the beginning of the year, many places started early, organized international trade enterprises to charter planes to go abroad to grab orders, set off an upsurge of overseas market expansion and business opportunities, and achieved remarkable results.

As an important measure to stabilize and strengthen foreign trade, a series of group "going out to the sea" actions will also continue to be organized in many places this year: Han Jie, the director of the Department of Commerce of Zhejiang Province, said at the "Department (Bureau) Channel" of the provincial two sessions recently that in December last year, more than 20 government and enterprise groups in Zhejiang Province "went out" and obtained more than 18 billion yuan of intended orders. In the next step, Zhejiang will continue to promote the "Zhejiang goods travel around the world" and organize thousands of enterprises to "go out" to expand the international trade market and grab orders.

Sichuan proposed to support enterprises to stabilize orders and expand the market, regularly organize enterprises to go to sea in groups, and hold the "Sichuan Travel the World · ASEAN Economic and Trade Promotion Activity".

On January 29, Shanghai issued the "Action Plan for Shanghai to Increase Confidence, Expand Demand, Stabilize Growth and Promote Development", which launched 10 actions and 32 policy measures to vigorously boost market expectations and confidence, including the implementation of the action to maintain stability and improve quality of foreign trade. We will support foreign trade enterprises to seize orders and expand markets, organize foreign trade enterprises to participate in various domestic and foreign exhibitions, and accelerate the normal entry and exit of business personnel.

Gu Jun, director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce, said that this year, we will focus on key markets and industries, and support foreign trade enterprises to seize orders, expand production capacity and increase share, so as to fully stabilize the basic market of foreign trade.

It is worth mentioning that since the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (RCEP) came into force one year ago, the policy dividend has been continuously released and has become a new engine for the sustained growth of imports and exports in many regions. This year, many places will also seize the opportunity of RCEP and expand the international trade market.

For example, Fujian proposed to actively cultivate a public platform for international marketing, support enterprises to use rules such as RCEP preferential tariffs to expand the market, seize orders, and promote "Fortune sells globally and buys Fujian goods globally". Shandong proposed to make good use of RCEP opportunities, carry out in-depth "one industry, one exhibition" and "one country, one exhibition" activities, strengthen ties with Japan, South Korea and ASEAN, increase the development of emerging markets such as the Middle East and Africa, and help enterprises go out to grab orders and expand markets.

Take multiple measures to optimize the structure

While making every effort to stabilize the basic situation of foreign trade, the reporter noted that a series of measures have been formulated to stimulate the potential of foreign trade, promote the innovative development of foreign trade, stabilize and improve quality, and add new impetus to the high-quality development of foreign trade.

This year, Shanghai will implement the "optimization and upgrading of trade in goods" action, continue to make every effort to cultivate new advantages in trade competition, and promote the stability and quality of foreign trade.

Fujian will actively promote the integration of industry and trade, strengthen the investment attraction of foreign trade industry chain, cultivate famous enterprises and famous brands in the field of foreign trade, develop digital trade, and promote the stable scale and optimal structure of foreign trade.

Chongqing will promote the optimization and upgrading of goods trade, build a national processing trade industrial park, a national foreign trade transformation and upgrading demonstration base and a national import trade promotion and innovation demonstration zone, consolidate the export advantages of computers, mobile phones and other products, expand the export of new energy vehicles, smart homes, smart medicine and other products, improve the import scale of advanced technology, important equipment, energy resources and other products, and promote the pilot of domestic and foreign trade integration.

Guangdong will implement the "six actions" to build a strong trade province, cultivate and introduce a number of trade headquarters enterprises, cross-border e-commerce leading enterprises, and modern business circulation leading enterprises, create a new batch of export industrial clusters of 100 billion yuan and trillion yuan, and support Shantou and Zhanjiang to build large export processing industrial zones. Build six import bases for bulk commodities, electronic components, aircraft, automobiles, agricultural and sideline products, and high-end consumer goods, establish full-license bulk commodity import and export companies, and promote the construction of import trade promotion and innovation demonstration zones.

Liaoning will further implement the "double volume growth of foreign trade" plan, actively carry out all-round trade promotion actions, and deepen the construction of the "single window" of international trade. We will comprehensively deepen the innovative development of service trade, create a national-level foreign trade transformation base and a characteristic service export base, build Shenyang and Dalian national service outsourcing demonstration cities with high standards, and cultivate new drivers of foreign trade.