"Made In China" Competitiveness Continues To Grow

When Premier Li Keqiang made the government's work report on the 5 day, when he talked about the development of foreign trade this year, he did not put forward specific indicators, instead, he replaced it with "import and export stabilization".

This not only indicates that the development of foreign trade will be more important this year, but also reveals that the government pays more attention to the cultivation of export competitiveness.

The main anticipated targets of economic and social development put forward in the 2015 government work report were counted, and the growth rate of import and export was far from the standard.

China's exports in 2015 shrank by 2.8% in dollar terms, the first annual decline since 2009.

Due to sluggish external demand and falling import and export prices, the total value of imports and exports in January was 1 trillion and 880 billion yuan, down 9.8% compared to the same period last year, and exports were 1 trillion and 140 billion yuan, down 6.6%.

This once again puts pressure on the market.

How to correctly view China's export situation and evaluate the competitiveness of China's manufacturing industry has become a hot topic of public concern.

China's trade in goods still ranks first in the world

"Foreign trade is trade between countries and must be compared under the international background.

We need to make a comprehensive comparison between quality and quantity.

Said Lu Xun, deputy director of the Ministry of foreign trade of the Ministry of Commerce.

From the international comparison, last year, Global trade showed a two digit negative growth. China's export growth rate is still better than that of the world's major economies and emerging market countries. The decline is far lower than the main trade partners and Global trade decline, and the import and export volume of goods trade still ranks first in the world. This is also the 3 consecutive year since 2013.

China's share in Global trade has increased by 12.2% percentage point from one point to more than 13%, which is the fastest year of China's global share.

In January, the import and export of China's foreign trade continued to decline.

But what we need to see is that the import and export of major economies in the world are sliding, and most of them are down by more than 10%.

It should be said that from the perspective of Global trade and economic development, China's foreign trade in January has continued its momentum in 2015.

"We are used to high growth and are not used to negative growth. We think there is a problem of negative growth. In fact, Global trade is negative growth in 2015.

Recently, WTO released the import and export data of 71 major economies in 2015, exports fell by 11% and imports fell by 12.6%.

Minister of Commerce Gao Hucheng said.

He believes that in 2015, China's foreign trade still delivered a satisfactory answer. When global trade was growing, China's growth rate was higher than that of other major economies. When global trade was declining, China's decline was the lowest.

According to WTO statistics, in the 1-11 months of 2015, exports from the United States (-6.8%), Germany (-11.2%), Japan (-9.4%), South Korea (-7.4%), Hongkong, China (-3.1%), India (-17.5%), South Africa (-9.5%), Brazil (-16.0%) and other countries and regions were all negative growth, which was 0.6 to 15 percentage points higher than that of our export (-2.5%).

In the 1-11 month of 2015, China's imports and exports exceeded US $56 billion 600 million, of which exports were more than US $667 billion 200 million.

"In 2015, the contribution rate of China's economy to global economic growth was over 25%. Under the backdrop of Global trade downturn, China's foreign trade imports and exports are still significantly better than other major economies in the world, which itself is an important contribution to World Trade and even global economic development."

Gao Hucheng said, "we should also adjust our thinking. China's foreign trade has indeed reached the stage of upgrading the quality and efficiency of the traditional industries and innovating the new industries. There is also a speed pformation, which is also a necessary step to improve quality, efficiency and innovation."

"Made in China" competitiveness continues to grow

China's share in the world market continues to grow.

This shows that global demand is weak, not China's lack of competitiveness.

The impact of demand on exports tends to be more cyclical, while the impact of domestic export competitiveness changes on exports tends to be stronger.

For a long time, export volume has attracted more attention than export competitiveness.

However, export volume can not answer whether the slowdown in export is affected by short-term shocks such as the reduction of external demand, or the long-term trend of weakening competitiveness. It is also difficult to judge the adjustment of industry and trade policies accordingly.

In addition to market share, what other indicators can reflect export competitiveness? Is China's export competitiveness increasing?

Let's look at a set of data:

From the perspective of trade, China's general trade exports maintained growth in 2015, and have become the main force to stimulate exports.

In 2015, general trade exports amounted to 12173 billion US dollars, an increase of 1.2%, accounting for 53.5% of foreign trade exports, an increase of 2.1 percentage points over the same period in 2014, and processing trade exports of 797 billion 800 million US dollars, down 9.8%, accounting for 35% of foreign trade exports, a decrease of 2.7 percentage points over the same period in 2014.

From the perspective of the main products, the export of mechanical and electrical products continued to grow in 2015, and the product structure was further optimized.

In 2015, the export of mechanical and electrical products was 1 trillion and 311 billion 930 million US dollars, an increase of 0.1% over the same period last year, accounting for 57.6% of foreign trade exports, an increase of 1.8 percentage points over the same period in 2014.

Among them, exports of mobile phones, ships, lamps and lanterns increased by 8.5%, 13.3% and 15% respectively.

Textile, clothing, shoes and other seven types of labor-intensive products exported 472 billion U.S. dollars, down 2.7% from the same period last year, accounting for 20.7% of foreign trade exports.

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From the main market, we have made progress in diversification of China's export market and maintained an increase in exports related to "one belt and one road".

China's share in the US, the euro area, the UK and Japan remained stable, exports to the US grew by 3.4% and exports to ASEAN increased by 2.1%.

Exports to India, Thailand, Vietnam and other countries increased by 7.4%, 11.7% and 3.8% respectively.

From the perspective of business entities, the export of private enterprises has been growing and has become the main force of export.

In 2015, private enterprises exported 10295 billion US dollars, an increase of 1.8% over the same period last year, accounting for 45.2% of foreign trade exports, an increase of 2.1 percentage points over the same period in 2014.

Shen Danyang, spokesman of the Ministry of Commerce, said that the trend of China's foreign trade structure adjustment has been improving, and the willingness to pform and upgrade has been strengthened.

Bloomberg economist Chen Shiyuan also wrote that China's market share in many emerging economies increased in 2015, while also preserving market share in developed economies.

China's exports are highly concentrated in the manufacturing sector.

China has maintained the core competitiveness of its products, and its main manufactures have maintained their advantages over other countries.

And China's export structure has become more diversified and complex, providing a cushion for negative shocks.

According to the index of economic complexity measured by the Harvard University to measure the diversity and complexity of a country, China ranked nineteenth in the world in 2014, significantly higher than the thirty-ninth in 2005 and forty-eighth in 1995.

China ranks higher in this list than most emerging market countries.

However, in view of the fact that China is still lagging behind most developed economies, this means that there is still room for further upgrading and diversification of export basket.

The key to export competitiveness lies in industrial competitiveness

Production cost, trade cost, production efficiency and real exchange rate are the main factors determining export competitiveness.

Why does China's foreign trade competitiveness continue to improve?

Gao Hucheng, Minister of Commerce, thinks: first, China's industrial system is very complete, its industrial chain is very long, and its supporting capability is very strong.

Two, China has a strong ability to innovate.

Since the international financial crisis in 2008, Chinese enterprises have taken the initiative to adjust.

Our investment in education is large enough for our country and small families.

In addition, the spirit of innovation is also a very strong competitive power in China.

The three is the development of new formats, including the pformation of traditional industries, including the innovation of new forms of business, such as Hangzhou's cross border e-commerce pilot, which added 10 billion US dollars a year.

Four, the government vigorously decentralization, clean up taxes and fees, improve efficiency, create a convenient, efficient, and legalized business environment for enterprises, reduce the burden on enterprises, and solve great difficulties in financing and financing.

Of course, what we need to see is that the rapid growth of China's foreign trade for 30 years is gone forever.

In the new era, China's foreign trade development is undergoing a series of trend changes in terms of external demand, competitive advantage and trade structure.

In the past, our comparative advantage and international competitiveness mainly depended on relatively low labor costs.

But capital intensive electromechanical and large-scale equipment is growing at a faster rate, which shows that the comparative advantage of our manufacturing industry is changing.

Bai Ming, a researcher at the Ministry of Commerce, believes that upgrading of foreign trade depends more on upgrading industries.

This is a gradual process and can not be accomplished overnight.

China's high-speed rail and nuclear power have made breakthroughs in the "going global" process, and China's export competitiveness is improving.

But we should also see that there is still a big gap between its competitiveness and the standard of trade power.

On the whole, China's foreign trade development mode is changing, and more depends on improving the comprehensive competitiveness of technology, brand and service to boost exports.

We should vigorously develop and optimize the trade structure and develop e-commerce, and we must continue to promote industrial upgrading with the current mass entrepreneurship and innovation.

Among them,

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Labor intensive industries also have huge room for improvement.

In 2016, the domestic and international situation faced by China's foreign trade is very complex and severe, and the downward pressure is still great.

Economists generally predict that China's exports may continue to surpass the global market this year, but because of global demand factors, the market for Chinese goods will only grow at a moderate rate.

In this year's government work report, we need to push forward "

"Construction, expansion of international production capacity cooperation, and promotion of innovation and development of foreign trade" will help improve quality and efficiency of China's foreign trade and achieve better stability.

We must speed up the pformation of the structural adjustment of foreign trade based on the current and long-term perspective.