Chinese premier stresses stabilizing foreign trade, investment

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, presides over a symposium on stabilizing foreign trade and investment in Beijing, capital of China, June 28, 2020. Vice Premier Han Zheng, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, also attended the meeting. (Xinhua/Xie Huanchi)

BEIJING, June 28 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Sunday urged continuous efforts to expand opening-up and stabilize the overall performance of foreign trade and investment.

Li, also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, said that stabilizing the overall performance of foreign trade and investment is of great importance to stabilizing economy and employment, at a symposium of government officials and enterprise executives.

Li said the country's foreign trade environment will remain grave and complex as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread worldwide and plunges the global economy into recession, while the Chinese economy is deeply integrated into the world economy.

The premier stressed efforts to ensure stability on the six fronts and security in the six areas, while promoting higher-level opening-up.

The six fronts refer to employment, the financial sector, foreign trade, foreign investment, domestic investment, and expectations. The six areas refer to job security, basic living needs, operations of market entities, food and energy security, stable industrial and supply chains, and the normal functioning of primary-level governments.

Li stressed the need to roll out new measures to keep foreign trade and investment stable, especially increasing support to secure small-, medium- and micro-sized firms and labor-intensive companies, while helping major foreign trade enterprises solve problems to better keep employment stable.

At the symposium, Li called for improving the implementation of export-tax rebates, guiding financial institutions to strengthen funding support to ease the liquidity difficulties of foreign trade enterprises, tapping the potential of customs clearance facilitation reform and optimizing services for enterprises.

The premier called for efforts to strengthen communication and coordination with relevant countries, unblock international freight transport channels, and open up more "fast tracks" to provide convenience for business personnel.

Li encouraged foreign trade companies to speed up transformation and upgrading and improve the quality and added-value of export products, while accelerating the development of cross-border e-commerce, online trading and other new models.

International cooperation in multiple areas and levels should be strengthened and the opening-up of the service sector, especially the high-end service industry, should be further expanded to establish a market-oriented, law-based and internationalized business environment, he said.

The premier also called for optimized preferential policies to attract more foreign investors, as well as more solid efforts to keep industrial and supply chains stable.