Promote Foreign Trade And Foreign Investment To Stabilize And Improve Quality

In the first half of this year, facing adverse effects such as the sluggish recovery of the world economy and shrinking external demand, my country’s import and export of goods reached 20.1 trillion yuan, a record high for the same period in history; the quality of foreign capital utilization has improved, especially the actual use of foreign capital in high-tech manufacturing industries has increased by 28.8% %. Under heavy pressure, foreign trade and investment continued to improve in quality.

Many experts pointed out in interviews that the current foreign trade and foreign investment development challenges and opportunities coexist, and we should continue to take effective measures to promote foreign trade and foreign investment to continue to stabilize and improve quality.
Foreign trade and foreign capital are more resilient

In the first half of the year, my country unswervingly promoted high-level opening up to the outside world, promoted the stable scale and optimized structure of foreign trade, and made greater efforts to attract and utilize foreign capital.

"Against the background of sluggish growth in global external demand and increasing uncertainties, the hard-won results of foreign trade in the first half of the year show that foreign trade has strong resilience and vitality." Zhao Ping, director and researcher of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, said.

In the first half of the year, the overall scale of my country's foreign trade achieved a positive growth of 2.1%, and the total value of imports and exports increased by more than 400 billion yuan year-on-year. Yang Changyong, a researcher at the Institute of Foreign Economics of the China Academy of Macroeconomics, said in an interview that in the first half of the year, the exports of the world's major economies mostly experienced low-speed growth or even negative growth. In contrast, my country's foreign trade development performance in the same period was better than the average level of major economies.

In the first half of the year, the quality of my country's foreign trade development has steadily improved. "While stabilizing exports to developed economies, exports to developing countries and emerging markets such as ASEAN have grown rapidly." Zhao Ping said that new high-tech products are becoming an important driving force for my country's export growth. In addition, from the perspective of regional layout, the pace of opening up and development in the central and western regions and the three northeastern provinces has accelerated.

Affected by multiple factors, global foreign direct investment is still facing downward pressure this year. Adding to the high base factor in the same period in 2022, my country's actual use of foreign capital in the first half of the year fell by 2.7% year-on-year, but the overall scale remained stable.

"Short-term data fluctuations do not affect foreign investment to continue to be optimistic about China's development prospects, and the overall trend of expanding investment in China has not changed." Zhu Bing, director of the Foreign Investment Management Department of the Ministry of Commerce, said.
There are favorable conditions for stabilizing foreign trade and foreign investment

Experts said that despite the complex and severe external environment, my country still has favorable conditions for stabilizing foreign trade and foreign investment.

Data show that in the first half of the year, the import and export of my country's private enterprises was 10.59 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 8.9%, accounting for 52.7% of the total import and export value. During the same period, foreign-invested enterprises imported and exported 6.16 trillion yuan, accounting for 30.7% of the total import and export value. "In recent years, private enterprises have surpassed foreign-funded enterprises and gradually become the main force for the steady growth of my country's foreign trade, but foreign-funded enterprises still occupy a stable share of imports and exports. Therefore, stabilizing foreign trade must also stabilize foreign investment. In a certain sense, stabilizing foreign investment means stabilizing foreign trade." Wang Xiaohong said.
Respond to challenges with solid measures

In response to the complex and severe external environment in the second half of the year, experts suggest that we should give full play to the advantages of my country's ultra-large-scale market to expand domestic demand, solve the practical difficulties faced by enterprises in their operations, and take solid measures to deal with the challenges of stabilizing foreign trade and foreign investment in the second half of the year.

Zhao Ping said that to achieve the goal of stabilizing the scale and optimizing the structure of foreign trade, we must continue to make efforts to help enterprises reduce costs and increase efficiency. It is necessary to make good use of the institutional dividends of the new stage of RCEP's full implementation and effectiveness to help enterprises further explore the international market. At the same time, it is necessary to maintain the basic stability of the RMB exchange rate at an equilibrium level under reasonable control.

Yang Changyong said that we should do everything possible to tap the market potential along the "Belt and Road", develop more marketable, high-quality and high-priced products, consolidate the recognition of Chinese products in developing countries' markets, and enhance the reputation of Chinese brands. At the same time, attach great importance to the export markets of developed countries in the United States and Europe, and support enterprises in intensively cultivating the markets of developed countries.
In addition, on the basis of continuing to implement the existing policy of stabilizing foreign investment, my country will focus on the common demands of foreign-funded enterprises such as fair competition, investment facilitation, and factor protection, and promote the introduction of a new batch of policies to optimize the foreign investment environment and vigorously attract foreign investment. policy measures. By continuing to hold the "Invest in China Year" series of activities, we will continue to improve the service guarantee level for foreign investment.