In 2018, under the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping as the core, MOFCOM thoroughly studied and implemented Xi Jinping's Thought on Socialism with Chinese characteristics for a New Era and the spirit of the 19th CPC National Congress, firmly adhered to the people-centered development philosophy, and concentrated on the major events, key points and implementation. Market operation and consumption promotion work have achieved new developments, new improvements, new breakthroughs, which provided strong support for promoting high-quality economic development, guaranteeing and improving people's livelihood.
First, consumption in the business sector opened up a new situation. Facing the profound and complex changes in domestic and international situation, the consumer market maintained a stable operation in 2018, the consumption scale expanded steadily, the consumption upgrading momentum continued unabated, the consumption pattern continued to innovate, consumption contribution increased significantly, and consumption continued to be the first driving force for economic growth for the fifth consecutive year. MOFCOM implemented in-depth the action plan of consumption upgrading, convened a national work conference to deploy the consumption work for the next five years, and promoted the implementation of 21 key tasks in 2018. Significant results have been achieved in optimizing the consumption environment of urban and rural communities, expanding effective supply, and innovating circulation methods. We implemented some opinions of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on improving the mechanism for promoting consumption and further stimulating the consumption potential of residents, and formulated the division of labor within MOFCOM to promote the implementation of relevant tasks. We guided the local people to develop their cities into international shopping hubs in accordance with the local conditions. We improved the consumption promotion platform and organized the local people to carry out consumption promotion month activities with innovation. We strengthened consumption policy research, conducted in-depth research on consumption upgrading, and proposed a series of policy measures to promote consumption upgrading.
Second, the investment attraction through the CIIE showed new achievements. We strengthened organization and mobilization to formulate investment attraction plans for the CIIE, and widely organized and invited buyers to participate in the event. More than 400,000 domestic and foreign purchasers from all industries and fields came to discuss the procurement. We focused on expanding the transaction, sorting out the list of 40,000 domestic buyers, organizing surveys on import demand of domestic enterprises, releasing analysis reports on supply and demand of major consumer goods, and accurately guiding enterprises to come to purchase. We guided and held the supply and demand matchmaking meeting before the exhibition of the 7 major sections, and did a good job in matching the key exhibitors and merchants. We guided the trading groups to do on-site supporting activities and actively promoted the transaction. The accumulated intentional turnover was US$57.83 billion on a yearly basis.
Third, market emergency control achieved new results. We effectively responded to various emergencies, actively responded to natural disasters such as typhoons and floods occurring since 2018, and the African swine fever epidemic, launched the secondary response mechanism to cope with typhoon Mangkhut at the earliest time and guided the relevant areas to provide emergency protection for a smooth market operation. We strengthened the building of protection and supply capacity, improved the emergency commodity database, revised the emergency commodity data monitoring report, optimized the emergency commodity delivery network, and increased a number of emergency protection and supply backbone enterprises. We deepened the reform of the reserve system and management methods of important commodity, established an alternative inventory list of the storage enterprises of the country’s reserve frozen beef and mutton, and changed the way of storage from planned distribution to the market-oriented way of open bidding. We organized the releasing of the reserve commodities in a timely manner, and worked with the Development and Reform Commission to deploy the reserve of the winter and spring vegetables in big northern cities.
Fourth, statistical monitoring took new steps. We revised the statistical survey system for typical enterprises of business services, and integrated the monitoring and statistical survey system for important commodity markets. We strengthened the basic research of new consumption statistics, established a high-quality development indicator system for domestic trade, and actively coordinated the National Bureau of Statistics to accelerate the implementation of service consumption statistics. Public service levels and information guidance accuracy continued to increase. Focusing on consumption development trends and market protection priorities, hotspots and difficult issues, we wrote more than 320 pieces of various dynamic information and special analysis, and released the interpretation of the operation of the consumer market timely through website and routine press conferences to respond to public concerns. More than 200,000 pieces of information were released through the business forecasting platform.
Fifth, new developments showed up in key industries. We promoted the quality and efficiency of the silk industry, pushed forward the construction of large-scale intensive sericulture bases, and organized 22 major producing provinces to formulate implementation plans for base construction. We improved the standard system, completed the Qualification Requirements and Management Regulations for National Raw Silk Reserve Warehouse and Technical Acquisition Requirements for Mulberry Silkworm Fresh Cocoons (Draft for Comment). The “China Silk Connection World” publicity exhibition was held at the Canton Fair to guide and organize the China International Silk Expo. We improved the management level of the refined oil circulation and accelerated the revision of the Administrative Measures on the Operation Qualification of Crude Oil and Refined Oil (Draft). We promoted the reform of administration streamlining, power delegating , and regulation and services improving, bettered the examination and approval system, and implemented the “Internet + Administrative Services” measures. We expanded opening up through canceling the restrictions on the number of foreign gas stations and the stock's proportion, and guided the Zhejiang Free Trade Zone to promote the implementation of the management measures on bonded bunker fuel system for international navigation vessels. We deployed and carried out safety inspection for refined oil circulation to effectively prevent safety risks.
In 2019, we will continue to follow the spirit of Xi Jinping's Thought on Socialism with Chinese characteristics for a New Era, thoroughly implement the spirit of the important speech delivered by General Secretary Xi Jinping at the celebration of the 40th anniversary of reform and opening up, and conscientiously implement the deployment of the Central Economic Work Conference and the National Business Work Conference. Focusing on the goal of striving to build a strong economic and trade power ahead of schedule, we will do a good job in market operation and consumption promotion, effectively maintain stable market operations, focusing on promoting the upgrading of consumption structure, and continuously enhance the fundamental role of consumption in economic development.
