1. Responding to uncertainties with high-quality development

 

China's economic development has not only made new achievements in promoting reasonable growth in quantity but has also made new progress in effectively improving quality since the beginning of this year. This is due to the country's efforts to navigate the challenging and complex international environment as well as the difficult tasks of achieving domestic reform, development, and stability.

 

2. Multi-pronged approaches to attract and utilize foreign investment

 

Investment is a key area of China's foreign exchange and cooperation. According to the "Opinions on Further Optimizing the Foreign Investment Environment and Increasing the Efforts to Attract Foreign Investment" recently released by the State Council, greater efforts must be made to effectively attract and utilize foreign investment, as well as to fully capitalize on China's enormous market. This is a crucial step in creating a new open economy system and encouraging high-level opening up to the outside world. Multiple steps must be taken, policy measures must be improved, and implementation must be strengthened in order to accomplish this.

 

 

 

1. The State Post Bureau, in collaboration with eight departments, including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, issued guiding opinions, proposing to establish approximately 30 national postal and express delivery hubs by 2027, which will serve as a demonstration and driving force nationwide.

 

2. The Ministry of Finance and three other departments issued a notice to implement a special guarantee plan to support scientific and technological innovation. By increasing the risk sharing and compensation of the national financing guarantee fund for small and medium-sized enterprises in the field of scientific and technological innovation, banks and government financing guarantee institutions at all levels will be guided to strengthen their financing support for relevant enterprises.

 

3. The General Office of China's State Council has released a set of guidelines for maintaining high-level participation in the basic medical insurance program in the long term. According to the guidelines, China will encourage people already covered by this program, which covered 1.334 billion, or over 95 percent, of its population at the end of 2023, to continue participating without quitting.

 

 

 

1. More than 32.4 billion inter-regional trips were made in China during the first half (H1) of 2024, up 7.4 percent from one year earlier, data from the Ministry of Transport showed on July 26. 

 

2. The total assets of central enterprises reached RMB 86.6 trillion as of the end of 2023, which is 2.8 times that of the end of 2012. The added value, business revenue, and profit have all doubled compared with 2012, according to the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council.

 

3. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism released data on July 26 showing that in the first half of the year, the number of outbound trips reached 2.725 billion, a year-on-year increase of 14.3 percent with the total outbound tourism expenditure reaching RMB 2.73 trillion, a year-on-year increase of 19.0 percent.

 

4. According to data released at the 2024 China Gold Congress, China's gold output in the first half of 2024 reached 179.634 tonnes, while gold consumption reached 523.753 tonnes.

 

5. The eighth China-South Asia Expo concluded on July 28, with domestic and foreign trade contracts worth over RMB 10 billion signed, according to the organizers.

 

6. China's installed new-type energy storage capacity had reached 44.44 gigawatts by the end of June, expanding 40 percent compared with the end of last year, the National Energy Administration (NEA) said on July 31.

 

7. With a population of 1.4 billion, China's ownership of high-value invention patents had climbed to 12.9 patents per 10,000 people by June this year, surpassing the national target set for the end of 2025, according to the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA).

 

8. China plans to renovate 54,000 old urban residential communities this year, and had started revamping 33,000 communities by the end of June, according to the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development.

 

9. China's lottery ticket sales rose 14.8 percent year on year to RMB 55.94 billion in June, data from the Ministry of Finance showed.

   

10. China recorded 423 million railway passenger trips in July, the first half of the two-month summer travel rush, data from China State Railway Group Co., Ltd. showed on August 1. The figure marked an increase of 4 percent from the same period last year. The company said that the average daily number of railway passenger trips reached 13.63 million in July.

 

 

(Source: Economic Daily)