China to Export More Machinery, Electronic ProductsChina has set the goal of achieving an annual growth rate of 15 percent in machinery and electronic product exports in the forthcoming five years.By 2005, it is expected that the country will export 180 billion U.S. dollars worth of machinery and electronic products, accounting for about a half of the country's total exports, said Wei Jianguo, assistant to the Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation (MOFTEC). Wei, who also heads the State Office for Exports of Machinery and Electronic Products, was in Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei Province, to attend a forum on international trade and China's exports of machinery and electronic products. In the first seven months of the year, China's machinery and electronic exports totaled 64.6 billion U.S. dollars, up 15 percent from the same period last year or accounting for 43.8 percent of the country's total exports. The foreign trade official believes that China has great machinery and electronic product export potential, though the country is only ranked 14th in the world in terms of export volume of machinery and electronic products. To get in line with the rules of the World Trade Organization (WTO), China will abandon its previous practice of rendering subsidies to encourage more exports of machinery and electronic products, but will introduce policy support featuring the principles of unification, standardization, transparency and priority instead, said Wei. According to Wei, policy support measures, including export tax rebates, export credit and export credit insurance will be practiced to encourage foreign trade companies to export more machinery and electronic products. China's exports of machinery and electronic products were worth 105.3 billion U.S. dollars in 2000, accounting for 42.3 percent of the country's total exports. |
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