"Stabilizing foreign trade and foreign investment is an important part of the implementation of the central Committee's and the State Council's 'six measures to stabilize' work. It is also the concrete starting point for stabilizing foreign trade entities and industrial and supply chains." Premier Li Keqiang stressed at an executive meeting of the State Council on July 29.

On the same day, the meeting made plans to further open up and stabilize foreign trade and foreign investment, and decided to deepen the trial of innovative development of trade in services. Li said the current global spread of COVID-19 has plunged the world economy into a deep recession and the international situation is full of uncertainty. The uncertainty of the external environment has brought new pressures and challenges to China's efforts to stabilize foreign trade and foreign investment and to ensure industrial and supply chains.

"To cope with the current difficulties and stabilize the basic market of foreign trade and foreign investment, we will, as always, treat both domestic and foreign investors alike, and put in place the policies we have introduced to help and assist enterprises. At present, we need to focus on the actual difficulties faced by foreign trade and foreign-funded enterprises, introduce targeted policies and promote opening-up at a higher level." The prime minister said.

Effective measures were introduced to support the expansion of the market and increase of orders for foreign trade enterprises

"At present, the outstanding problem that foreign trade enterprises reflect is that orders are decreasing. Orders are the basis for the production and operation of foreign trade enterprises. If there are fewer orders, there will be less room for the development of enterprises." "All regions and government departments should fully implement the tax and fee cuts and other assistance policies that have been decided to help enterprises and effectively reduce the burden on enterprises," Li said. At present, we should take effective measures to support the expansion of the market and increase orders, especially in view of the decline in orders from foreign trade enterprises."

The Premier made it clear that we will support foreign trade enterprises in strengthening their resilience to risks. Use export credit insurance to actively protect the risk of cancellation of orders before shipment. We will promote "credit assurance + guarantee" to provide credit enhancement support for foreign trade enterprises in financing. We will encourage the central and western regions and the northeast to give full play to their advantages and undertake labor-intensive foreign trade industries. We will support the development of new forms of business such as cross-border e-commerce, overseas warehouses, and foreign trade enterprises that provide comprehensive services. We will expand trials of ways to purchase and trade on the market, and encourage small, medium-sized and micro businesses to export.

Li stressed the need to improve the policy environment for attracting foreign investment. We will give equal treatment to key foreign-funded projects and increase land use and other guarantees. We will improve the convenience of identifying foreign-funded high-tech enterprises. Equal support will be given to foreign-funded enterprises such as the special quota for re-lending and the size of new loans extended by the Export-Import Bank.

Developing trade in services will not only help stabilize foreign trade and foreign investment, but also promote the continuous upgrading of the foreign trade industry

"We need to raise awareness of the importance of developing trade in services and give greater play to the role of trade in services in stabilizing foreign trade and foreign investment." Li said.

The premier pointed out that China's service trade has been growing rapidly in recent years, and the growth rate of service trade has exceeded that of goods trade.

"The development of trade in services will not only help stabilize foreign trade and foreign investment, but also promote the continuous upgrading of the foreign trade industry towards high quality." Li said.

Meeting in the day, play a role of stabilizing foreign service trade for stabilizing foreign trade, combining with the regional development strategy, to develop trade in services innovation pilot parts of expanded to 21 provinces throughout the country, expanding the area of open, enhance the level of convenient reform exploration, including cross-border commercial medical insurance, promote the development of sino-foreign cooperation in running schools, expanding the scope of the technical qualification of import and export business operators, under the "prevention and control to strengthen international cooperation in tourism and sports, etc.

"The mature experience and practices of service trade in pilot areas should be summarized and promoted on a larger scale to promote opening-up at a higher level," Li concluded.

Source: Ministry of Finance, PRC