National Development and Reform Commission: There is no so-called deflation in China's economy

Consumers buy dairy products at a supermarket in Xinle City, Hebei Province/Xinhua News Agency

Yesterday, the State Council Information Office held a regular briefing on State Council policies, at which relevant responsible persons of the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Finance and People's Bank of China interpreted the economic situation and policies. Cong Liang, deputy director of the National Development and Reform Commission, said that economic recovery is a process of wave-like development and tortuous progress. With the superposition of stock policy and incremental policy, policy effects continue to accumulate, and positive factors continue to increase, and the mainland economy will recover and improve for a long time.

There is no deflation in the Chinese economy, and there will be no deflation in the later period

"At present, there are many internal and external noises of bearish China and singing about China, and I want to say that this argument has never been realized in the past, and it is not destined to be realized now and in the future." Cong Liang stressed that since August, all relevant parties have continued to optimize a number of phased policies, studied and introduced a number of highly targeted new measures, actively planned a number of reserve policies, and systematically played a set of policy "combined fists".

With the continuous emergence of the effect of policy combination, the growth rate of industrial added value above designated size and total retail sales of social consumer goods recovered in August, the decline in import and export narrowed, consumer prices turned from falling to rising, the decline in factory prices of industrial producers and enterprise profits continued to narrow, the national urban survey unemployment rate fell slightly, the manufacturing PMI continued to rise, positive factors in economic operation were accumulating, bright spots were increasing, and social expectations were improving.

At the same time, in response to changes in the economic situation, all relevant departments have carried out policy pre-research and reserve on a regular basis, and promoted the timely introduction and implementation of reserve policies. At present, a number of reserve policies have been introduced to promote the sustained recovery of the economy, including raising the special additional deduction standard for personal income tax and the minimum wage standard in some regions, promoting mass consumption such as automobiles, and orderly expanding the scale of issuance of real estate investment trusts in the infrastructure sector.

In response to the price problem that has attracted much attention recently, Cong Liang said that prices have still been running at a low level since this year, which needs to be paid attention to. However, judging from factors such as price level, demand recovery, economic growth, and money supply, there is no so-called deflation in China's economy, and there will be no deflation in the later period.

"The price indicator is a lagging indicator of economic operation, and with the steady recovery of demand, the gradual enhancement of market confidence, the continuous improvement of economic operation, and the gradual weakening of the low base effect, the overall price level of the mainland is expected to continue to recover and gradually rise to near the annual average level." Cong Liang said.

The RMB exchange rate against the US dollar is very important, but it is not the whole of the RMB exchange rate

Since the beginning of this year, the international situation has been complex and changeable, and the global foreign exchange market has fluctuated greatly. Recently, the exchange rate of the renminbi against the US dollar has continued to come under pressure. Zou Lan, director of the Department of Monetary Policy of People's Bank of China, pointed out at the press conference that the exchange rate of the RMB against the US dollar is very important, but it is not the whole of the RMB exchange rate, compared with the bilateral exchange rate of the RMB against the US dollar, the RMB against a basket of exchange rate currencies can more fully reflect the change of currency value.

Zou Lan introduced that the RMB against a basket of currencies can mainly focus on the RMB exchange rate index released by the China Foreign Exchange Trading Center. At present, it contains 24 basket currencies, corresponding to the total trade between countries or regions and the mainland accounts for more than 60%, of which the weight of the US dollar, the euro, the yen is relatively large, respectively 19.8%, 18.2% and 9.8%, on September 15, the RMB exchange rate index was reported at 98.51, up 1.8% from the end of June, of which the RMB appreciated 2.5 against the euro and 4.1 against the yen. Since mid-July, thanks to the steady recovery of the domestic economy, the RMB has risen steadily against a basket of currencies, affected by the strengthening of the US dollar index, the bilateral exchange rate against the US dollar has depreciated, and it has maintained a relatively strong position against non-US dollar currencies.

"There is still ample policy space for monetary policy to respond to challenges and changes that exceed expectations." Zou Lan stressed that since the beginning of this year, the People's Bank of China has fully implemented the decision-making and deployment of the Party Central Committee and the State Council, prudent monetary policy is precise and powerful, counter-cyclical adjustment has been strengthened, effectively and effectively responded to domestic and foreign risk challenges, consolidated the good trend of economic recovery, and the results of monetary and credit policies have initially appeared, and it has the ability, confidence and conditions to maintain the smooth operation of the foreign exchange market. In the next stage, we must resolutely correct unilateral and pro-cyclical behaviors, resolutely deal with behaviors that disrupt market order, and resolutely prevent the risk of exchange rate overshoot.

The transfer payments from the central government to local governments have reached 9.55 trillion yuan

Since the beginning of this year, the mainland economy has gradually recovered from the impact of the epidemic in the past few years, and has generally shown a good trend. However, in some places, the economic development is insufficient, and the fiscal operation is in a tight balance.

Li Xianzhong, director of the Treasury Department of the Ministry of Finance, said that in 2023, the central government will arrange 10.06 trillion yuan in transfer payments to local governments. By the end of August, the central government had allocated 9.55 trillion yuan in transfer payments to local governments, and all those that met the conditions had been issued, providing a strong financial guarantee for ensuring the smooth operation of local finances.

The Ministry of Finance has established a national financial operation monitoring center to implement "T+1" penetrating monitoring of the financial operation of various regions, covering more than 40 monitoring indicators such as budget adjustment, fiscal revenue and expenditure, transfer payments, and treasury balances, so as to realize the dynamic monitoring of the whole process of fiscal funds from the source of budget arrangement to the end of use, and achieve early detection, early reporting and early disposal of emerging problems and hidden risks, and firmly strengthen the bottom line of the "three guarantees" at the grassroots level.

In terms of special bonds, Li Xianzhong said that from January to August, 3.7 trillion yuan of new special bonds have been issued, and financial departments at all levels have continued to accelerate the issuance and use of special bonds. From January to August, various localities issued 2.95 trillion yuan of special bonds for project construction, completing 77.5% of the annual new special bond limit, 10.8 percentage points faster than the sequential progress. The bond funds have supported about 20,000 special bond projects, which are mainly used in municipal construction and industrial park infrastructure, social undertakings, transportation infrastructure, affordable housing projects, agriculture, forestry and water conservancy and other key construction fields determined by the Party Central Committee and the State Council, promote the implementation of a large number of projects that benefit people's livelihood, make up for shortcomings, and strengthen and weak, and effectively play the leverage role of government investment.

Accelerate the implementation of the work plan for stable growth in the ten key industries

Industry is the "ballast stone" of the macroeconomy and the main battlefield for stable growth. Tao Qing, director of the Operation Monitoring and Coordination Bureau of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said that in August, industrial production recovered steadily, and enterprise efficiency gradually improved. Since the beginning of this year, the equipment manufacturing industry has been the main force to promote industrial growth, especially the development momentum of high-end equipment manufacturing industry.

In August, the added value of industries above designated size in the mainland increased by 4.5% year-on-year, 0.8 percentage points faster than the previous month. The industrial producer price index (PPI) continued to narrow, with a further narrowing rate of 1.4 percentage points in August compared with the previous month, and the product sales rate of industrial enterprises above designated size was 97.4%, which has recovered to a level of more than 97% for two consecutive months. The decline in corporate profits also narrowed further. With the decline in the price of upstream raw materials, the revenue of enterprises is improving, and the cost pressure of enterprises has eased.

Tao Qing said that in the next step, it is necessary to strengthen the coordinated implementation of policies, step up the implementation of the work plan for stable growth in ten key industries, promote the implementation of stable growth policies, strengthen quality brand building, promote supply-side innovation, and create demand with high-quality supply. At the same time, we will guide enterprises to expand the international market according to local conditions and further tap export potential. In addition, it is necessary to step up efforts to enhance development momentum, deeply implement intelligent manufacturing projects, and accelerate the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries. The system will promote the development of emerging industries such as 5G, intelligent networked vehicles, and new materials, open up new fields and new tracks, cultivate a number of new growth engines, and create new competitive advantages.

This group of texts/this newspaper reporter Dong Xin

(Beijing Youth Daily)