Since 2017, under the strong leadership of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) has firmly established the "four awarenesses", comprehensively implemented the spirit of the 19th CPC National Congress, conducted an in-depth study of Xi Jinping thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era, implemented new concepts of development, continued to pay close attention to the implementation of a series of State Council's policies on promoting foreign trade development in concert with different departments and local authorities surrounding the goal that "we will ensure that foreign trade continues to pick up and register steady growth" as put forward in the Report on the Work of the Government, vigorously promoted optimization in the layout of international and domestic markets, product structure, business operators and trade modes, sped up the construction of the demonstration bases for foreign trade transformation and upgrading, trade platforms and international marketing networks, continued to promote pilot projects on new forms of foreign trade and vigorously facilitated the innovative development and gradient transfer of processing trade and the implementation of proactive and effective import policies. The development of foreign trade has made remarkable achievements: the growth has exceeded expectations; the structure has been further optimized; power conversion has been accelerated. These achievements have not only made significant contributions to the national economy and social development, but also played an important role in the recovery of world economy and trade.
First, the growth of foreign trade exceeded expectations. According to the statistics of the Customs, the total imports and exports from January to November this year reached RMB25.14 trillion, up 15.6%. Specifically, exports reached RMB13.85 trillion, up 11.6%; imports reached RMB11.29 trillion, up 20.9%. The negative growth for two consecutive years was reversed, and the growth rate hit a new high in 6 years. Meanwhile, from an international perspective, our imports and exports outperformed major economies including the U.S. According to the latest statistics released by the World Trade Organization (WTO), the growth rate of imports and exports in the first three quarters this year (demonstrated by U.S. dollars) was 5.4, 4.6 and 3.0 percentage points higher than the U.S., German and Japan, respectively.
Second, the structure was continuously optimized. In the diversified international markets, imports to BRICS and countries along the Belt and Road, such as Brazil, Russia, India, South Africa and Malaysia achieved rapid growth, while the traditional markets such as the U.S., EU and Japan markets were consolidated. The domestic regional layout was more balanced. Exports in the central and western regions increased by 19.1%, 7.5 percentage points faster than the national overall growth rate, and accounted for 15.9% of China's total exports, up 1.0 percentage point year on year. The product structure was further improved. Exports of high-tech and high value-added products increased by 13.2%, 1.6 percentage points higher than the overall growth rate, and accounted for 29.1% of China's total exports, up 0.4 percentage point. The trade modes were further optimized. General trade exports increased by 12.4%, and accounted for 54.4% of China's total exports, up 0.4 percentage point. With the common development of business operators, private enterprises, maintaining their position as the top export operators in China, grew by 13.6% and their exports accounted for 46.7% of China's total exports, up 0.8 percentage point.
Third, impetus conversion was accelerated. With the rapid growth of new business formats such as cross-border e-commerce and market procurement trade, these formats became new bright spots in the growth of foreign trade. The cultivation of new impetuses had achieved remarkable results. From January to November, exports in cross-border e-commerce comprehensive experimental zones more than doubled, and exports under the market procurement trade increased by 36.7%.Through promoting the construction of trade platforms, demonstration bases for foreign trade transformation and upgrading and international marketing networks, the innovation, brand building and marketing capabilities of foreign trade enterprises had been constantly enhanced. Exports of products with proprietary brands, intellectual property rights and marketing channels and high-tech, high-value-added and high-efficiency products grew rapidly. A large number of enterprises continued to innovate, made their efforts from the supply side, transformed and upgraded themselves, continuously improved their international competitiveness, and thus effectively met or even created market demands.
Fourth, foreign trade made greater contributions to national economy and social development. From January to November, China's tax revenue in imports reached RMB1.73 trillion, up 25.8%, and accounted for 12.7% of the national tax revenue, up 1.5 percentage points, increasing the fiscal revenue. Trade surplus achieved RMB2.56 trillion, making a positive contribution to improving the balance of payments, increasing foreign exchange reserves and maintaining the stability of the RMB exchange rate. The number of jobs directly and indirectly brought by foreign trade reached about 180 million, accounting for over 20% of the total jobs in China. China’s per capita cultivated land, water, minerals, forests and energy resources represented only one-tenth to one-half of the world average. From January to November this year, the number of China's imports of crude oil, iron ore, natural gas and other seven categories of bulk commodities increased by 0.7% to 24.4 %, which not only safeguarded the demand in the domestic market, but also eased the increasing tightened resource constraints on China's economic development.
Fifth, foreign trade played an important role in the recovery of global economy and trade. Adhering to the basic national policy of opening up and implementing the mutually beneficial opening up strategy, China would further benefit other countries and people while achieving its own development. At present, China has become one of the largest markets in the world, with imports accounting for about one-tenth of the global share. Since the beginning of this year, the stable domestic economy with improvement and progress has been constantly consolidated, which has led to the sustainable and rapid growth of imports and made an important contribution to the recovery of global economy and trade growth. According to the statistics of the WTO, in the first three quarters this year, the growth rate of China's imports was 10.9, 8.9, 7.7 and 7.1 percentage points higher than that of the U.S., Germany, Japan and the world, respectively. The increase in imports contributed 17% to the growth of global imports. The share of our imports in the global imports increased by 0.7 percentage point to 10.2%.It is expected that in the next five years, China's imports will amount to US$8 trillion, which will provide a broader market and more precious cooperation opportunities for the rest countries in the world.
The report of the 19th CPC National Congress sets forth expanding foreign trade, fostering new business formats and new modes of trade and promoting the building of a powerful trade country, giving a direction for our proper foreign trade work. In 2018, we will thoroughly implement the spirit of the 19th CPC National Congress and the deployment of the Central Economic Work Conference, take Xi Jinping thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era as the guidance, adhere to new concepts of development, deepen the supply-side structural reform in the field of foreign trade, vigorously implement innovation-driven growth, continue to effectively promote the optimization of five aspects and the construction of three projects, actively foster new business formats and new modes of trade, promote the innovative development of processing trade, properly hold the China International Import Expo to build an open and cooperative working platform on which countries all over the world can show their national development achievements and international trade can be carried out, implement more active import policies, consolidate and enhance traditional advantages, foster new advantages in competition, promote the transformation of a large trade nation to a powerful trade nation, and play a more important role in national economy and social development, so as to make greater contribution to the realization of the Two Centenary Goals and the Chinese dream of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
