Chinese premier stresses flood control, financial opening-up

BEIJING, July 21 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Wednesday called for efforts to ramp up flood control and disaster relief in affected regions and promote opening-up in the financial sectors.

Li made the remarks when chairing a State Council executive meeting, which also detailed measures to facilitate cross-border trade and improve business environments at ports.

Li said the country should allocate funds and supplies to help Henan with rescue, emergency relocation, and disaster relief. Li stressed emergency response plans for transport infrastructure and preventing secondary disasters.

In this regard, he also called for efforts to ramp up meteorological monitoring and the overhaul of water conservancy infrastructure.

On the financial sectors' opening-up based on a negative list, Li said it should serve as a hub for attracting foreign investment and meet international standards. It would signify higher levels of opening-up, he added.

These sectors should improve the market entry mechanism for overseas financial institutions such as banks and insurance companies and help improve foreign investors' participation in the Chinese financial market.

While keeping the yuan exchange rate stable at a reasonable and balanced level, the country needs to optimize the macro-prudential policy framework and build mechanisms for monitoring and assessing financial risks to ensure that the financial market works steadily, Li said.

The meeting decided that more work will be done in the second half of this year to streamline customs clearance and sustain the stable growth of foreign trade.

Accordingly, the country should increase customs clearance efficiency and convenience for export tax rebates, ensuring tax rebates take no more than seven working days on average by the end of this year.

The country needs to build more overseas warehouses, improve the return policy for exports in cross-border e-commerce, and ensure that its trade facilitation measures connect with those of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.

Efforts should also reduce import and export costs and provide better services at ports, the meeting said.