1. Breaking through bottlenecks to meet grain yield targets

 

The proposed goal of ensuring that the grain output for 2024 remains above 650 million metric tons is conducive to stabilizing expectations, boosting confidence, securing China's food supply, and fostering self-assurance in the ability to effectively address risks and challenges. It will also provide solid support for vigorously promoting rural revitalization and enhancing the country's development through Chinese path to modernization.

 

2. Continuously expanding middle-income group

 

Expanding domestic demand is a key part of unclogging the economic circulation, consolidating domestic fundamentals, and building a new development paradigm. It is also a proactive approach to fully leverage China's huge market. The super-large scale market, mainly composed of middle-income group, is a powerful advantage for the sustained and healthy development of China's economy.

 

1. In a recent plan, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology suggested that by the end of 2025, the standard and regulatory system for elderly-oriented digital technology will be more sound. Digital transformation for the aging population will be effectively expanded and the level will continue to deepen. Both the quality of digital product services and the user experience will be greatly enhanced.

 

2. China's Supreme People's Procuratorate released a guideline mandating persistent efforts to prosecute money laundering and associated offenses, appropriate risk management in small and medium-sized banks and other financial institutions in compliance with the law, strictly crackdown on securities offenses like market manipulation and financial fraud, and  deliver unwavering punishment for financial corruption crimes.

 

 

1. Renewable energy has become a new force to ensure China’s electricity supply, as data from National Energy Administration showed. The installed capacity of renewable energy reached 1.45 billion kilowatts, accounting for more than 50 percent of China’s total installed power generation capacity, and overtook that of fossil fuel for the first time. 

 

2. As of the end of November 2023, there have been 66,000 urban renovation projects nationwide, and among them 53,000 are projects of renovation of old urban residential communities, benefiting 8.82 million residents, according to Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development.

 

3. State-owned banks including Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of China, China Construction Bank cut deposit interest rates on December 22, 2023. The reduction of deposit interest rates ranges from 0.1 percentage point to 0.25 percentage point according to different types and terms of deposits.

 

4. Transaction data from Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) showed that RMB’s share in global payments rose from 3.6 percent in October to 4.6 percent in November 2023, a record high for RMB. RMB’s share in global payments has surpassed Japanese yen to become the fourth largest currency in global payments.

 

5. According to the data released on December 25, 2023, from the National Bureau of Statistics, the Yangtze River Delta Regional Development Index in 2022 hit 129.5, with 2015 as the base period, showing an increase of 1.6 compared with the previous year, with an average annual increase of 4.2.

 

6. The profit of China’s central state-owned enterprises totaled RMB 2.4 trillion from January to November in 2023. The enterprises completed a cumulative investment in fixed assets (including real estate) of RMB 4.1 trillion, an increase of 9.1 percent year on year, and invested more than RMB 900 billion in research and development, an increase of nearly RMB 70 billion year on year.

 

7. Data released by the National Bureau of Statistics on December 27, 2023, showed that the profit of major industrial enterprises increased by 29.5 percent year on year in November, with the growth rate accelerating compared with that of October, and the profit achieved positive growth for four consecutive months.

 

8. China’s newly-added tax and fee cuts and deferrals reached RMB 1.8 trillion in the first 11 months in 2023, according to the State Taxation Administration.

 

9. The total business income of state-owned enterprises amounted to RMB 76.2 trillion from January to November in 2023, up 3.9 percent year on year, according to the Ministry of Finance.

 

10. As of December 28, 2023, Daqing Oilfield has produced 30 million tons of crude oil in 2023, maintaining the level of 30 million tons of production for 9 consecutive years. The production of natural gas reached 5.8 billion cubic meters, with 13 consecutive years of steady growth.

 

(Source: Economic Daily)