China aims to boost development of light industry

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, along with other two ministries, launched a working plan on Friday to stabilize light industries, including home appliances and batteries, so as to drive new consumption growth in the country.

Light industries are basically the production of consumer goods such as food, household appliances, clothing, housing, transportation, as well as entertainment.

According to the working plan, China aims to boost the annual growth of light industries to reach 4 percent annually on average by 2024, and boost the revenue of companies in the field to exceed 25 trillion yuan ($3.49 trillion) in total. 

The country also vows to promote more than 300 upgraded and innovative light industry products, enhance the competitiveness of the top 100 enterprises in the sector, as well as cultivate 50 light industrial clusters with a market scale of over 30 billion yuan each. 

He Yaqiong, head of consumer goods and industry at MIIT, said: "Light industry has played an important role in boosting domestic demand and driving consumption, and this role has become more prominent."

According to He, more efforts will be made to drive the growth of six major light industries, including household products, plastic products, papermaking, leather, batteries and food.

Accelerated steps will also be made to explore new light industries such as "elderly products, baby products, cultural, sports and leisure products, biological manufacturing, as well as prefabricated food".

He disclosed that the ministry will launch a plan for companies to make prefabricated food for the greater growth of such consumption.

The working plan also pointed out that efforts will be made to drive the battery sector, including improving battery energy density, and reducing thermal runaway and to accelerate the research and application of key technologies and materials in the fields of lead-acid batteries, lithium-ion batteries and primary batteries.