What to do to stabilize the economy in 2024?

On December 26, the Economic Information Daily published an article "Multiple Departments List of Tasks for 2024 to Stabilize Economic Policies and Reveal New Trends". According to the article, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Finance, the People's Bank of China, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other departments recently held a meeting to implement the spirit of the Central Economic Work Conference and deploy the focus of work in 2024. "Scientific and technological innovation", "expanding domestic demand" and "deepening reform...... These keywords on the list of priorities of each department can provide insight into new trends in future economic policies.

Leading the development of the industry with "scientific and technological innovation".

The Central Economic Work Conference will "lead the construction of a modern industrial system with scientific and technological innovation" to the top of the key tasks of economic work next year, and the work deployment of many departments in 2024 is also inseparable from "scientific and technological innovation".

Focusing on the 2024 annual work deployment, the National Industrial and Information Technology Work Conference held a few days ago clarified 12 key tasks, including "making every effort to promote the steady growth of the industrial economy", "fully implementing the high-quality development action of key industrial chains in the manufacturing industry", "enhancing the ability of industrial scientific and technological innovation", "accelerating the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries", "consolidating and enhancing the leading position of advantageous industries", "accelerating the cultivation of emerging industries", etc.

The Ministry of Science and Technology has also put forward five key tasks, including strengthening the overall coordination of scientific and technological work and improving the new national system, focusing on key core technologies related to national development and security, gathering strength to make breakthroughs, deploying forward-looking leading technologies and cultivating new competitive advantages in future industries, strengthening national strategic scientific and technological forces, strengthening the ability to systematize scientific and technological innovation, deepening the reform of the scientific and technological system, and building a policy system and a good environment that supports high-level scientific and technological self-reliance and self-reliance.

Fiscal, tax and monetary policies will also strongly support scientific and technological innovation. The National Financial Work Conference proposed to "fully support and win the battle of key core technologies, ensure the capital needs of major national science and technology projects, deepen the reform of the mechanism for the allocation and use of financial science and technology funds, and promote high-level science and technology self-reliance and self-reliance". The Party Committee of the State Administration of Financial Supervision and Administration held an enlarged meeting to propose to improve the quality and efficiency of science and technology finance, and help accelerate the development of new productive forces and the construction of a modern industrial system.

"On the one hand, the mainland economy is in a critical stage of transformation from traditional factors-driven to new factors such as science and technology, data, etc., and it is urgent to improve the level of total factor productivity by strengthening independent research and development capabilities and grasp the major opportunities of a new round of scientific and technological revolution; Liang Jing, a researcher at the Bank of China Research Institute, said.

Actively deploy around the "expansion of domestic demand".

The Central Economic Work Conference stressed the need to "focus on expanding domestic demand" and "to stimulate potential consumption, expand productive investment, and form a virtuous circle in which consumption and investment promote each other."

All departments have actively deployed around the expansion of domestic demand. The National Financial Work Conference held a few days ago will support the expansion of domestic demand as one of the eight key tasks in 2024, and propose to promote the construction of a unified national market, promote the steady growth of consumption, strengthen the management of the use of special bond funds, continue to make good use of the additional treasury bond funds, consolidate the basic market of foreign trade and foreign investment, and support the enhancement of the main driving force of domestic demand.

The National Development and Reform Work Conference also listed "further making good use of various funds to strengthen project construction and better play the key role of effective investment" as a key task in 2024. These include "strengthening the efficiency and making good use of government investment such as the issuance of 1 trillion yuan of government bonds, central budget investment, and local government special bonds in 2023", "making greater efforts to stimulate private investment, establishing a normalized project push mechanism for key industries, promoting the implementation of a new mechanism for public-private partnership, and encouraging more private capital to participate in the construction of major national engineering projects and projects to make up for shortcomings".

The Ministry of Commerce stressed that it is necessary to promote consumption from post-epidemic recovery to continuous expansion, cultivate and expand new consumption, stabilize and expand traditional consumption, optimize the consumption environment, and promote trade-in. Promote the relaxation of market access for service industries such as telecommunications and medical care, benchmark international high-standard economic and trade rules, continue to build a market-oriented, law-based, and international first-class business environment, and build the "Invest in China" brand.

The National Conference on Industry and Information Technology proposed to deepen the "three products" action of raw materials and consumer goods to boost bulk consumption such as new energy vehicles and electronic products. The State Administration of Financial Supervision and Administration said that it will speed up the development of consumer finance and actively support the expansion of profitable investment.

Han Wenxiu, deputy director of the Central Finance Office in charge of daily work and director of the Central Agricultural Office, said a few days ago that under the super-large-scale market, there is still huge potential for consumption and investment in the mainland in the future. "The mainland is characterized by a high savings rate, and as expectations improve, high savings will be converted into consumption and investment, and there is a huge potential investment demand in areas such as new infrastructure and coordinated regional development. He said.

Reforms in key areas will continue to advance

The Central Economic Work Conference stressed the need to plan major measures to further deepen reform in an all-round way, and continue to inject strong impetus into promoting high-quality development and accelerating Chinese-style modernization.

Focusing on the continuous improvement and implementation of the "two unswerving" system and mechanism, and fully stimulating the endogenous power and innovation vitality of various business entities, the Party Committee of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council held an enlarged meeting and proposed to "deeply implement the deepening and upgrading of the reform of state-owned enterprises, strive to achieve stable growth with higher gold content, further boost market confidence, lead the development of the industry, and resolutely act as a stabilizer and ballast stone of the national economy." The National Development and Reform Work Conference proposed, "Promote the development and growth of the private economy, put down the requirements for equal treatment of state-owned enterprises and private enterprises in terms of system and law, create a good environment to encourage and support the development of the private economy from the policy and public opinion, and coordinate and solve the problems restricting the development of the private economy on a case-by-case basis and as a whole." ”

The meetings of various departments also revealed new trends in the reform of the fiscal and taxation system and the reform of the financial system. The National Financial Work Conference demanded that "we should actively and steadily plan to promote a new round of fiscal and taxation system reform, improve the modern budget system, optimize the tax structure, and improve the fiscal transfer payment system." The Party Committee of the People's Bank of China held an enlarged meeting and mentioned "deepening the reform and opening up of the foreign exchange field".

Zhao Wei, chief economist of Guojin Securities, said that in 2024, the deepening of reforms in key areas will continue to advance, including the reform of financial supervision and financial institutions, the deepening reform of state-owned enterprises, and the reform of relevant systems of private enterprises, so as to increase support for the development of the real economy and economic transformation and upgrading.

Source丨Xinhua News Agency