Will the Sino-US trade war change the fundamentals of our economy?
Release time:
2018-10-27
Recently, the General Administration of Customs released the latest data showing that my country's foreign trade achieved rapid growth in the first three quarters, the structure continued to be optimized, the power conversion accelerated, and the quality and efficiency further improved. The overall steady and positive trend of import and export has been further consolidated, laying the foundation for the high-quality development of foreign trade.
Recently, the General Administration of Customs released the latest data showing that my country's foreign trade achieved rapid growth in the first three quarters, the structure continued to be optimized, the power conversion accelerated, and the quality and efficiency further improved. The overall steady and positive trend of import and export has been further consolidated, laying the foundation for the high-quality development of foreign trade.
Judging from the overall foreign trade situation of the textile and clothing industry, in terms of US dollars, in September this year, China's textile and clothing exports were 26.608 billion US dollars. Among them, textile yarn, fabrics and products exports 10.6 billion U.S. dollars, clothing accessories 16.008 billion U.S. dollars. In the first three quarters, the total export of textiles and clothing was 207.77 billion billion US dollars, a cumulative year-on-year increase of 4.6 percent, and continued to maintain steady growth. Among them, the export of textiles in the first three quarters was 89.29 billion US dollars, a cumulative year-on-year increase of 10.5; the export of clothing was 118.48 billion US dollars, a cumulative year-on-year increase of 0.6.
In terms of RMB, China's textile and clothing exports totaled 1350.34 billion billion yuan in the first three quarters, down 0.6 percent from the same period last year. Among them, textile exports in the first three quarters were 579.34 billion billion yuan, up 4.7 percent from the same period last year, while clothing exports totaled 771 billion billion yuan, down 4.2 percent from the same period last year. In September, the total export of textiles and clothing was 181.95 billion yuan, including 72.45 billion yuan of textiles and 109.5 billion yuan of clothing.
When introducing the operation of my country's foreign trade in the first three quarters, the person in charge of the Foreign Trade Department of the Ministry of Commerce pointed out that the value of my country's foreign trade import and export increased quarter by quarter in the first three quarters of 2018, and the year-on-year growth rate in the third quarter was significantly higher. The import and export growth of some countries along the "Belt and Road" is better. At the same time, mechanical and electrical products, labor-intensive products are still the main export. In the first three quarters of 2018, China's exports of seven major categories of labor-intensive products, such as clothing and toys, totaled 2.29 trillion billion yuan, down 0.8 percent from the same period last year, accounting for 19.3 percent of the total export value.
A spokesman for the General Administration of Customs said that since the beginning of this year, China's economy has maintained an overall stable and stable development trend, and a number of economic indicators have been generally stable. Although the international economic and trade situation is facing uncertain and unstable factors, the overall global trade in goods has maintained growth. Under the combined effect of various factors at home and abroad, my country's imports and exports continued to maintain a steady and progressive development momentum in the first three quarters.
Nevertheless, export enterprises still need to pay attention to and prevent export risk factors. The 2018 National Risk Analysis Report recently released by the China Export Credit Insurance Corporation suggests that since the trade friction between China and the United States, U.S. buyers have abandoned their goods due to their inability to pay their own import tariffs, or due to rising costs leading to poor downstream sales, and thus maliciously defaulting on payments has increased. In terms of overseas investment, after the implementation of the "Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act" in the United States, Chinese companies will face broader investment reviews, longer review cycles and stricter reporting systems. This will make Chinese enterprises to invest in the United States face greater uncertainty. At present, the differences between China and the United States are still concentrated in the field of trade, but the risk signals in the field of investment are gradually emerging.
The question that is receiving widespread attention now is, will the trade war change the fundamentals of our economy? In addition to import and export data, there are these data to watch!
The trade war will not change our economic fundamentals.
The National Bureau of Statistics released data on the 19th. According to preliminary calculations, the GDP in the first three quarters was 65089.9 billion billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 6.7 percent at comparable prices. It has remained between 6.7 and 6.9 per cent for 12 consecutive quarters, with major macroeconomic indicators operating steadily in a reasonable range. The "market" of the economy is stable, and market expectations are also improving. Major international institutions are generally optimistic about my country's economic development prospects and believe that the Chinese economy shows strong development momentum.
Will the trade war change the fundamentals of our economy?
It depends not only on speed, but also on efficiency, quality, and structure, and more importantly, on the profound changes that have taken place behind the economic operation.
First, look at the benefits. Let's talk about corporate efficiency first. In the first half of this year, the profits of industrial enterprises above designated size increased by 17.2 year-on-year, which was further accelerated from January to May; the operating profits of service enterprises above designated size increased by 22.6, which also maintained a relatively high growth rate. From January to July, the economic operation of state-owned and state-controlled enterprises across the country was good, with solvency and profitability improved over the same period last year, and profits increased by 21.4 year-on-year. Looking at residents' income, in the first half of this year, the per capita disposable income of residents nationwide was 14063 yuan, a nominal increase of 8.7 per cent over the same period last year. After deducting price factors, the real increase was 6.6 per cent; the per capita net property income was 1166 yuan, an increase of 10.5 per cent.
Second, look at the quality. As an important indicator of the quality of economic growth, China's labor productivity continues to improve, with total labor productivity of 101231 yuan per person in 2017, an increase of 6.7 percent over the previous year. Capacity utilization rate rebounded significantly, of which the coal, steel industry is more obvious, operating quality and efficiency significantly improved.
Third, look at the structure. Consumption and service industry have become the main driving force of economic growth. In the first half of this year, the contribution rate of consumption to economic growth reached 78.5 percent, an increase of 14.2 percentage points over the same period last year, and 47.1 percentage points higher than the contribution rate of investment. With the steady growth of residents' income and the continuous increase of effective supply, the pace of consumption upgrading is gradually accelerating, especially the service consumption continues to be strong, the online retail is growing rapidly, and the consumption potential of rural residents is continuously released.
Fourth, look at the new momentum. New industries and new products are growing rapidly, and the driving force of new growth points has increased. In the first half of the year, the added value of strategic emerging industries in industries above designated size increased by 8.7 year-on-year, 2 percentage points faster than industries above designated size, and the output of new energy vehicles increased by 88.1 year-on-year. Robots increased by 23.9, and integrated circuits increased by 15.0. The operating income of strategic emerging service industry, science and technology service industry and high-tech service industry increased by 18.1, 17.5 and 15.4 respectively, 2.4, 5.0 and 4.5 percentage points faster than that of the same period of last year.
Fifth, look at foreign trade. In the first seven months of this year, the total value of China's import and export of goods trade was 16.72 trillion billion yuan, an increase of 8.6 percent over the same period last year, of which exports increased by 5 percent and imports increased by 12.9 percent. In terms of product structure, the export of high-tech products such as electromechanical products has grown rapidly, indicating that the trend of transformation and upgrading of foreign trade is obvious.
Six, look at coordination. The "Belt and Road" construction, the coordinated development of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, and the development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt have been implemented in depth; the rural revitalization strategy has been fully deployed, and the integration of urban and rural areas has been accelerated; the three major battles of preventing and resolving major risks, precise poverty alleviation, and pollution prevention have achieved remarkable results. The effects of regional coordination, urban-rural coordination and policy linkage are initially apparent.
In this context, let's analyze the impact of the trade war on China's economy. In 2017, our total economic volume has reached 12.7 trillion US dollars, and our foreign exports have reached 2.26 trillion US dollars. 200 billion US dollars accounted for 8.8 per cent of our total exports. If the impact of processing trade is considered, the impact on value added will be smaller. Compared with China's total economic output and future development space, this loss is bearable and digestible. However, the trade war may have "spillover effects" on other economic fields, politics, diplomacy, and social psychology, which cannot be underestimated. At present, in response to the high tariff suppression of the United States, my country has issued corresponding plans to counter simultaneously; in response to the possible adverse effects of multinational companies in China, including American companies in China, we have both strategic arrangements and a large number of measures to reserve; In response to the US's high-tech "stuck neck" and attempts to block my country's industrial chain, we are actively carrying out more extensive international exchanges and cooperation, let the huge domestic market space become an important platform for integration with the world, and forge a promising future in meeting the major opportunities of the new round of technological and industrial revolution and the major challenges of the external environment.
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