Liu Qian, trainee reporter of 21st Century Business Herald, reported from Wuhan
In the future, how to walk the "balance beam" of epidemic prevention and control and economic development is not only related to the production and life of this megacity with a permanent population of more than 12 million, but also directly determines whether it can return to the eighth place in the country's GDP after a gap of one year.
On August 13, at the ninth press conference on the prevention and control of the epidemic in Wuhan, 21st Century Business Herald reporters noticed the emergence of two new faces, namely Yu Gongbao, deputy director of the Wuhan Municipal Development and Reform Commission, and Li Linqing, deputy director of the Wuhan Municipal Bureau of Economy and Information Technology.
"Wuhan will plan a new round of policies to stimulate consumption, study and plan a series of activities to stimulate consumption, pay attention to online and offline coordination, and help enterprises such as business, trade, catering and accommodation to recover." At the same time that Yu Gongbao made this statement, the Wuhan Center for Disease Control and Prevention released this data, and on August 12, Wuhan reported 0 new confirmed cases of new coronary pneumonia and 0 new cases of asymptomatic infection. This is the first time since the current round of the epidemic that Wuhan has achieved zero new additions.
Affected by the epidemic in 2020, Wuhan's GDP was 629.53 billion yuan, 31.71 billion yuan lower than Nanjing, ranking tenth. In the first half of this year, Wuhan's economic recovery momentum is very eye-catching, not only the GDP growth rate of 28.6% to win the first place in the country, the total GDP also reached 825.15 billion yuan, higher than Nanjing 62.87 billion yuan, jumping to the ninth place, Nanjing ranked tenth.
Does the repeated outbreak of the epidemic since August 2 affect the strong recovery of Wuhan, and can Wuhan return to the top eight in the second half of the qualifying battle?
<b>Try to avoid the "fuse" of the meridians of social operation</b>
On August 3, after one year of zeroing, seven people in Wuhan tested positive for the new crown virus nucleic acid, which was the first time that a locally imported epidemic situation appeared in Wuhan after the new crown cases were cleared in June last year. On August 3, a street in Wuhan's Economic Development Zone was classified as a medium-risk area, and Wuhan immediately launched a nucleic acid test for all employees.
"Strive to find an 'optimal balance' between epidemic prevention and control, economic development and social security." Wang Pu, a professor at the School of Journalism and Information Communication of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, said in an interview with the 21st Century Business Herald that compared with last year's epidemic, the prevention and control ideas in Wuhan have changed greatly. After finding out the bottom number through nucleic acid testing of all employees, while comprehensive prevention and control, the maximum scope and maximum extent to maintain the normal operation of the social system, the normal and necessary commercial activities within the controllable range, multi-channel increase the people's livelihood security, and strive to avoid the "circuit breaker" of the social operation meridian.
According to the latest version of the "Hubei Province COVID-19 Prevention and Control Regional Management Rules", Wuhan has adopted differentiated circle management, dividing the key areas of epidemic prevention and control into "three districts":
The discovery points, settlements, work points, activity points and surrounding areas of medium- and high-risk areas and positive cases are closed areas; the settlements, work points, activity points and surrounding areas of high-risk groups in the close connection, sub-close connection and common exposure of high-risk groups in positive cases are control areas; and the activity areas of key groups that may be exposed outside the closed areas and control areas are prevention areas.
In the management of the circle layer, Wuhan implemented different epidemic prevention measures for different circles, carried out nucleic acid testing with different frequencies, and locked the epidemic in a community or even a residential building. "It's from 'indiscriminate operations' to 'targeted' clearance." Wang Pu believes that this time Wuhan adopts a dynamic management model, strengthens the accuracy and difference of regulation, focuses on the deployment of risk establishment or hidden risks, "fights when it appears", and avoids "the fall of the whole city".
"After experiencing 2020, coupled with the blessing of vaccines, in the face of this year's epidemic, Wuhan citizens are certainly anxious, but their hearts are no longer panicked and not chaotic, and the degree of cooperation is also obvious to all." Wang Pu believes that the composite structure model of "plate prevention and control" and "linear prevention and control" constructed by Wuhan divides prevention and control into a number of "plate subjects", one by one, emphasizing that each "module" has the responsibility and first response, the "plate" can act cheaply, and the internal resources are flexibly allocated.
<b>The production of 30 key enterprises is stable</b>
He Zhenyu, deputy director of the Wuhan Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters that the purpose of precise prevention and control is to prevent and control the epidemic at the smallest cost, the most accurate measures and the smallest cost, so as to minimize the impact on economic and social development and the lives of the people.
Last year, Wuhan was completely "locked down", and industrial investment was the most affected, with a decline of 83.2% in January and February last year alone. In addition, the continuous delay in the resumption of work has led to a difficult situation for small and medium-sized enterprises. Luo Zhi, director of the New Private Economy Research Center of Wuhan University, said at the time that small and medium-sized enterprises had struggled for two and a half months and had reached the limit of survival, and if they could not resume work in a large area at the end of March, the number of small and medium-sized enterprises would decline rapidly.
In this round of epidemics, through differentiated circle management, economic factors can flow stably within the controllable range. According to the data, at present, the production of 30 key industrial enterprises in Wuhan is generally stable; 208 key supermarket stores, 58 key e-commerce enterprises, and 2 major agricultural wholesale markets are operating normally; and the urban construction key project rail transit line 5, line 6 phase II, line 12, the east lake section of the two lakes tunnel, and the southern extension of Heping Avenue have remained advanced.
Li Linqing introduced that in this round of epidemics, for enterprises in key industries such as automobiles and biomedicine, Wuhan has made every effort to coordinate the supply of raw materials and the smooth transportation of products in the upstream and downstream of the supply chain inside and outside the city. Implement classified policies, "one enterprise, one policy", and special policies for special classes for key enterprises, and support enterprises to make every effort to stabilize production and increase production, achieve production and achieve results under the premise of epidemic prevention and control standards, and fully release development potential and kinetic energy.
At the same time, Wuhan has helped small and medium-sized enterprises cope with the impact of the epidemic through a series of policy supports. Li Linqing introduced that Wuhan will implement a number of measures to reduce the cost of small and medium-sized enterprises, increase the financial support and labor protection of small and medium-sized enterprises, and strictly implement tax and fee reduction policies such as reducing unemployment insurance rates and returning unemployment insurance to stabilize posts, effectively reducing enterprise costs.
In order to alleviate the financial pressure of enterprises, Yu Gongbao said that Wuhan will make good use of the policy-based financing guarantee loan risk compensation funds for small and medium-sized enterprises and continue to implement the special loan policy for bailouts. Open "green channels", accept and implement various employment support policies, and organize and carry out various recruitment activities. Establish a green channel for review, and accelerate the progress of capital approval and timely disbursement for projects that are included in the scope of special fund support for supporting the development of enterprises, have clear policy standards, and are implemented to specific enterprises.
<b>A new round of consumption stimulus is coming</b>
Under the premise that the epidemic situation can be controlled, Wuhan has begun to plan a new round of consumption stimulus policies. At a press conference on August 13, Yu Gongbao and Li Linqing both mentioned that Wuhan plans to take measures to stimulate consumption and help commercial and trade enterprises accelerate recovery.
In the construction of a new development pattern with the domestic cycle as the main body and the domestic and international dual cycles promoting each other, all localities have always taken the promotion of consumption as an important measure for economic recovery after the epidemic last year.
In 2019, Wuhan achieved a total retail sales of social consumer goods of 744.964 billion yuan, ranking sixth in the country. In 2020, as the city most affected by the epidemic, Wuhan immediately introduced a series of consumption stimulus "combination fists" after the unsealing, including the issuance of consumption coupons and free tickets for A-class scenic spots.
From April 19, 2020 to July 31, 2020, Wuhan has invested a total of 500 million yuan in "Wuhan Consumption Coupons" over a period of more than three months. While Wuhan Municipal Finance received 500 million yuan of funds, Alibaba, Meituan and Tencent also matched the platform, institutions and merchant consumption coupons with a total value of about 1.8 billion yuan to participate in the activities. In other words, a total of 2.3 billion yuan of consumption coupons were invested in the Wuhan market.
In 2020, Wuhan's total retail sales of social consumer goods fell to tenth in the first three quarters, and under the impetus of a series of policies, it surpassed Hangzhou in the whole year and ranked ninth. In the first half of this year, although the growth rate of total retail sales of social consumer goods in Wuhan reached 28.1%, it was once again surpassed by Hangzhou, which led Wuhan by 19 billion yuan.
In this round of epidemics, the first to be affected is still the catering, tourism and other industries. In Wuhan, in addition to retaining some places closely related to residents' lives, other places such as commercial and trade services, entertainment, catering, and fitness activities are closed. A certain number of supermarkets, farmers' markets, etc. may be retained in the control area; the prevention area shall suspend the operation of closed business premises, supermarkets and farmers' markets shall restrict the flow, and catering establishments shall prohibit dine-in. Even in non-epidemic prevention and control areas, citizens have consciously reduced their opportunities to go out.
In the study of the top ten cities with consumption in the first half of the year by the 21st Century Economic Research Institute, it is mentioned that among the top ten cities in the first half of the year, except for Wuhan, the total retail sales of social consumer goods in other cities have exceeded half of last year. "For Wuhan, the recovery and improvement of consumption will be a longer process, which needs to give Wuhan more patience, and the government can also take more active measures to promote consumption."
In any case, stimulating consumption has always been the focus of Wuhan's development. Pan Helin, executive dean of the Digital Economy Research Institute of Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, said that short-term intensive consumption stimulus measures such as consumption coupons can play a significant role in boosting local consumption and the economy, and the government needs accurate guidance in the later stage to maximize the actual role of the policy.
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