Work urged to further stabilize foreign trade, investment

The General Office of the State Council, in a circular on Aug 12, urged efforts to further stabilize foreign trade, foreign investment and industrial supply chains as the nation is facing complex and tough situations in foreign trade and investment, against the backdrop of the continuous epidemic and severe economic recession in the world.

The move is to further ensure stability in six areas, namely employment, people's livelihoods, the development of market entities, food and energy security, stable operation of industrial and supply chains, and operations at grassroots levels. It also seeks to stabilize employment, finance, foreign trade, foreign investment, domestic investment and market expectations.

The circular required a more important role for export credit insurance. China Export & Credit Insurance Corporation should actively safeguard orders against the risk of being canceled before shipment under the premise of controllable risks.

Also, eligible regions should copy and expand the financing model featuring “credit plus guarantee insurance”, and multiple methods should be adopted to help enterprises engaged in foreign trade enhance credit levels and support them with easier financing.

It also stressed support for new business forms of trade, calling on efforts to increase about 30 pilot projects in market procurement and trading in eligible places nationwide.

Appropriate regions are encouraged to support gradient transfer of processing trade to foster a batch of processing trade industrial parks jointly built by companies in China’s eastern and central, western and northeastern areas.

It also required further support for labor-intensive export enterprises, apart from common preferential policies, such as tax and fee cuts, export credit loans and insurance, stabilization of employment and discounts in electricity and water charges.

What’s more, work should be done to make a list of large-scale, backbone foreign trade enterprises to help solve their problems in production and operations. And, research on accelerating tax returns for them should be done.

Online channels of foreign trade should be expanded, it said, and local governments, as well as key industry associations, are encouraged to hold online exhibitions.

Customs clearance should be further facilitated, and the business environment at ports should be improved, according to the circular.

It also highlights work to facilitate foreign business people’s trips to China. With strict epidemic prevention and control measures in place, negotiations on green channels with other countries should be continued to facilitate personnel exchanges in important business, logistics, production and technical services of foreign trade and foreign enterprises.

The circular also calls on providing financial support to key foreign-funded enterprises, increasing services for key foreign investment projects, encouraging foreign capital to flow to high-tech industries, and lowering the threshold for foreign R&D centers to enjoy preferential policies.