As a programmatic document guiding China's economic and social development, the implementation of the 14th Five-Year Plan is more than halfway through.
Zheng Shajie, director of the National People's Congress, recently made a mid-term assessment report on the implementation of the "Outline of the 14th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People's Republic of China and the Long-Range Objectives Through the Year 2035" (hereinafter referred to as the "Outline") to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress. The report points out that among the 20 main indicators specified in the 14th Five-Year Plan, 16 indicators such as GDP growth are basically in line with or faster than expected, while 4 indicators, such as the reduction of energy consumption per unit of GDP, are relatively lagging behind.
Zheng Shajie said that China's current economic and social development is facing many difficulties, which have brought challenges to the implementation of the "Outline", which is reflected in the prominent impact of key core technologies, the imperfect long-term mechanism for expanding residents' consumption, the reform of key areas There are still many hard bones, the total amount of pollutants and carbon emissions is still high, the supply of public services is insufficient and the misallocation of resources coexists, and there are still many risks and hidden dangers in some key areas.
2024 is a crucial year for achieving the goals and tasks of the 14th Five-Year Plan. According to the analysis of a number of experts, it is necessary to put stable economic growth in a more prominent and important position, focus on releasing the potential of domestic demand, enhancing innovation capabilities, cultivating development momentum, focusing on deepening reform and opening up, stabilizing social expectations, and boosting development confidence, paying more attention to the dynamic balance and coordinated linkage of multiple goals of macro policies, and continuing to do a good job in the implementation of the goals and tasks of the "14th Five-Year Plan".
More than half of the progress and more than half of the task.
In accordance with the provisions of the Supervision Law of the Standing Committees of the People's Congresses of the People's Republic of China at All Levels, the State has conducted a comprehensive assessment of the implementation of the Outline in conjunction with all relevant parties, formed a mid-term assessment report, systematically sorted out the progress of the main objectives and indicators, major strategic tasks and major engineering projects since the implementation of the Outline for more than two years, deeply analyzed the main problems and challenges faced, and put forward the main measures to further promote the implementation of the Outline.
The implementation of the Outline has achieved more than half of the progress and more than half of the tasks. According to the mid-term assessment report, 16 of the 20 main indicators in the five aspects of economic development, innovation-driven, people's livelihood and well-being, green ecology and safety and security are basically in line with or faster than expected.
Among them, four indicators, such as the urbanization rate of permanent residents and the participation rate of basic pension insurance, were achieved ahead of scheduleFive indicators, including the growth of R&D investment in the whole society and the proportion of added value of core industries in the digital economy in GDP, are faster than expectedSeven indicators, including GDP growth, labor productivity growth, and per capita disposable income growth, were basically in line with expectations.
In addition, there are four main indicators lagging expectations, namely the reduction of energy consumption per unit of GDP, the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP, the proportion of days with good air quality in cities at the prefecture level and above, and the number of children under the age of 3 per 1,000 population.
Zheng Shajie said that for the four indicators that are lagging behind the progress, it is necessary to optimize and adjust the policy, increase the intensity of tackling tough problems, and do our best to promote the completion of the planning goals. It is necessary to further improve the energy consumption and carbon emission intensity control policies, resolutely curb the blind launch of high-energy-consuming, high-emission and low-level projects, strictly and reasonably control the total coal consumption, vigorously promote the transformation of energy conservation and carbon reduction in key areas, accelerate the implementation of key emission reduction projects for major pollutants, and improve the scientific and accurate pollution controlFor the number of infants and young children under the age of 3 per 1,000 population, it is necessary to coordinate the allocation of childcare service resources for children aged 0-6, increase the implementation of existing policies, and guide social forces to participate in construction and operation.
Increase income and boost consumption.
Since the 14th Five-Year Plan, major and profound changes have taken place in the development environment at home and abroad, which has brought difficulties and challenges to the full fulfillment of the goals and tasks of the Outline.
The mid-term assessment report mentions that adhering to innovation-driven development and accelerating the development of a modern industrial system are major strategic tasks specified in the Outline. Although the pace of scientific and technological research has been significantly accelerated in the past two years, and major breakthroughs have been made in some fields, China's independent innovation ability is still not strong, especially the basic research is relatively weak, and the situation of key core technologies being controlled by others has not fundamentally changed, which restricts the safety, stability and upgrading of the industrial chain.
Zheng Shajie said that in the coming period, a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation in the world will give birth to major breakthroughs, and it is difficult to change the situation of technological blockade in some countries, so we must accelerate the breakthrough of key core technologies, achieve high-level scientific and technological self-reliance and self-reliance, and avoid technology and industry being locked in the middle and low end.
The Outline emphasizes the need to adhere to the strategic basis of expanding domestic demand, accelerate the cultivation of a complete domestic demand system, smooth the domestic cycle, and promote domestic and international dual circulation. Over the past two years, the construction of a new development pattern with the domestic cycle as the main body and the domestic and international dual cycles reinforcing each other has been accelerated, and the contribution rate of domestic demand to economic growth has increased from 74 in 20207% to 82 in 20229%, the gravitational field effect of the strong domestic market on global resource elements continues to appear.
The mid-term assessment report pointed out that the lack of aggregate demand is still a prominent contradiction facing the current economic operation, especially the low proportion of final consumption in GDP, and the proportion of household consumption has declined in recent years. Household consumption is mainly related to residents' disposable income, public services and social security level, but the most important influencing factor is the income level of residents. It is necessary to speed up the improvement of the distribution system, strive to increase the proportion of residents' income in the distribution of national income and increase the proportion of labor remuneration in the primary distribution, effectively narrow the gap in the distribution of residents' income, improve the expectation of income growth, and fundamentally boost residents' consumption.
**Zhang Liqun, a researcher at the Development Research Center, analyzed the first financial news that consumption in 2023 will show a trend of overall recovery, highlighting the concentrated release of rigid demand for consumption under **. However, in order to achieve sustainable growth in household consumption, it is still necessary for the employment situation to continue to improve and the income of residents to continue to grow. Therefore, it is necessary to make more significant achievements in giving priority to employment and increasing residents' income, which is the most important foundation for a sustainable rebound in consumer demand in the next step.
Yang Weimin, former deputy director of the Central Finance Office, said at the China Wealth Management 50 Forum a few days ago that expanding household consumption is a problem to be solved in the next step of development. To establish and improve a long-term mechanism for expanding household consumption, it is necessary to make adjustments and changes in concepts, policies, and systems. All departments and localities should put more focus on household consumption and policies, at least on the same level as investment. It is necessary to implement targeted policies for different income groups, with the low-income group focusing on increasing fiscal transfer payments, the middle-income group focusing on non-intervention and non-restriction, and the high-income group focusing on expanding the supply of high-end consumer goods and high-end services.
Deepen reform and prevent risks.
There are still many hard bones in the reform of key areas. The report mentions that the layout and structure of the state-owned economy need to be further optimized and adjusted, and private enterprises still face many constraints in terms of factor acquisition, market access, property rights protection, and fair competition. The high-standard market system is not perfect, and industry barriers, local protection and regional segmentation, and low-level vicious competition still exist to varying degrees. The relationship between clear powers and responsibilities, financial coordination, regional balance and local finance needs to be further improved, and the basic system and function of the capital market are not perfect.
Zheng Shajie said that the implementation of the reform of state-owned enterprises to deepen and upgrade the action, break down market access barriers, improve the normalization of arrears prevention and clean-up mechanism and financing support policies, improve the normalization of communication and exchange mechanisms with private enterprises, strengthen system construction, and maximize the mobilization of the enthusiasm and initiative of private enterprises. Improve the market access system, strengthen anti-monopoly and anti-unfair competition, and deepen the reform of the mechanism of important energy resources. We will further promote the construction of a market-oriented, law-based, international, and first-class business environment.
The National Development and Reform Commission recently held a national conference on the reform of the development and reform system in Nanning, Guangxi, and clarified the four key reform tasks in 2024, one is to accelerate the construction of a unified national market, the second is to continuously improve the implementation of the "two unwavering" system and mechanism, the third is to continue to promote the reform of key industries such as electric power and oil and gas pipeline networks, and the fourth is to continue to promote major reform pilots.
Over the past two years since the implementation of the 14th Five-Year Plan, the key tasks of strengthening national economic security as defined in the Outline have been carried out, and the food security strategy, energy and resource security strategy, and financial security strategy have been implemented in depth.
The mid-term assessment report pointed out that improving the resilience and security level of the industrial chain is facing the dual pressure of external suppression and industrial relocation. Real estate risk, financial risk and local debt risk are deeply correlated. The pressure on total employment and structural problems cannot be ignored, and the employment pressure of key groups such as youth and migrant workers is greater. In the coming period, China's internal and external environment will become more complex and severe, and the difficulty of coordinating development and security will increase significantly, so it is necessary to improve risk awareness and response capabilities.
Zheng Shajie said that financial supervision should be strengthened in an all-round way, and risks such as real estate, local debt, and small and medium-sized financial institutions should be resolved as a whole, and all financial activities should be included in supervision in accordance with the law. Promote a virtuous cycle of finance and real estate, improve the main supervision system and capital supervision of real estate enterprises, establish a long-term mechanism to prevent and resolve local debt risks, and firmly guard the bottom line of no systemic financial risks.
Chen Wenjing, director of market research at the China Index Research Institute, analyzed that at present, real estate risks are mainly reflected in the debt resolution of real estate enterprises and the delivery of projects, and it is expected that the financial support policies for enterprises will continue to be implemented in detail in 2024.
Wang Yiming, vice chairman of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, said that a series of measures have been taken to prevent and resolve real estate risks, and the economic work conference emphasized that "to meet the reasonable financing needs of real estate enterprises of different ownership without discrimination", which is very critical in solving the problem of the supply side capital chain. At the same time, the "three major projects" play an important role in driving relevant investment and alleviating real estate pressure on real estate enterprises. The next step is to include the reform of the fiscal and taxation system at the institutional level to solve the long-term mechanism of preventing and resolving local debt.