The State Council Information Office held a series of press conferences on the "Achievements of China's High Quality Economic Development" on the 15th, introducing the relevant situation of business work serving high-quality development. Li Yongzhao, Deputy Representative of the Ministry of Commerce for International Trade Negotiations, stated that in 2024, the Ministry of Commerce will resolutely implement the decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee and the State Council, promote high-quality development of commerce, and overall smooth and steady business operations throughout the year, making positive contributions to the economic recovery and improvement. Domestic consumption is steadily growing. The total retail sales of consumer goods in the first 11 months of 2024 reached 44.3 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 3.5%. From the perspective of commodity consumption, driven by policies such as exchanging old for new consumer goods, the sales of products such as automobiles, household appliances, home decoration, kitchen and bathroom have exceeded 1.3 trillion yuan. Among them, green and intelligent products are highly favored, especially new energy vehicles, primary energy consuming household appliances, smart home products, etc. From the perspective of service consumption, with the continuous emergence of new scenarios and norms in service consumption, the potential of service consumption is constantly being released. The retail sales of service consumption increased by 6.4% in the first 11 months of 2024, with information and entertainment consumption being relatively active. Foreign trade has reached a new high. The total import and export of goods for the year was 43.8 trillion yuan, an increase of 5%, reaching a historical high. Among them, exports and imports increased by 7.1% and 2.3% respectively. In the first 11 months of 2024, the import and export of services reached 6.7 trillion yuan, an increase of 14.2%. It is expected that the import and export of services for the whole year will also reach a historical high. The investment structure continues to be optimized. In the first 11 months of 2024, 52000 foreign-funded enterprises were newly established, attracting a total of 749.7 billion yuan in foreign investment. China continues to relax market access, achieving zero entry restrictions in the manufacturing sector. High tech manufacturing accounts for 11% of investment attraction, and pilot opening up in service industries such as telecommunications and healthcare is also ongoing. Many projects are already in the process of negotiation and implementation. Foreign investment cooperation is developing steadily. In the first 11 months of 2024, foreign non-financial direct investment amounted to 915.2 billion yuan, an increase of 12.4%. The newly signed contracts for foreign contracted projects amounted to 1.4 trillion yuan, an increase of 13%. The high-quality economic and trade cooperation of jointly building the "the Belt and Road" continues to deepen and become more practical, and highlights of cooperation in green, digital, blue and other fields continue to emerge. Bilateral economic and trade cooperation has yielded fruitful results. On the multilateral front, China has achieved practical results of "1+10" at the 13th Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization, and also reached agreements on investment and trade facilitation and e-commerce in 2024. In 2024, China will continue to expand its "circle of friends" of free trade partners, and currently the trade proportion of free trade partners has exceeded one-third. For example, last year China substantially concluded negotiations with ASEAN Free Trade Area 3.0, signed a free trade upgrade agreement with Peru, and promoted the implementation of free trade agreements or upgrade agreements with Serbia, Maldives, Singapore and other countries. China has also signed framework agreements for common development economic partnerships with 23 African countries. When it comes to foreign investment work in 2025, Li Yongzhao stated that the Ministry of Commerce will follow the decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee and the State Council, carry out the "subtraction" of the negative list, optimize the "addition" of the business environment, and steadily expand institutional opening up. On the one hand, we need to increase our efforts in independent opening up and continuously relax market access. On the other hand, we need to continue building the "Invest in China" brand, creating a first-class business environment, and doing an "additive" to optimize the business environment. In addition, it is necessary to actively connect with international high standard economic and trade rules and build high-level open platforms. Meng Yue, the head of the Foreign Trade Department of the Ministry of Commerce, stated that in 2025, China will continue to expand its high-level opening-up to the outside world, closely adhere to the keyword of high-quality development, and promote stable growth in foreign trade. Last year, the Ministry of Commerce promoted the introduction of a series of measures, including the "Several Policy Measures to Promote Stable Growth of Foreign Trade". Next, the Ministry of Commerce will work closely with various localities and departments to implement policies, promote effective good experiences and practices, help foreign trade enterprises stabilize orders, overcome bottlenecks and bottlenecks, and promote stable development of foreign trade. When it comes to the focus of the Ministry of Commerce's work in expanding consumption in 2025, Li Gang, Director of the Market Operation and Consumption Promotion Department of the Ministry of Commerce, stated that efforts should be made to expand the market and implement the policy of exchanging old for new consumer goods, in order to stabilize the basic consumption base. Recently, the central government has allocated the first batch of funds of 81 billion yuan for the trade in of consumer goods by 2025. This week, the Ministry of Commerce will gradually issue the implementation rules for the 2025 subsidy for the exchange of old cars, home appliances, home decoration, and electric bicycles, as well as the purchase of new digital products such as mobile phones. Next, we will further optimize the policy operation process, strengthen policy promotion and interpretation, and enable consumers to have a clearer understanding of policies and enjoy benefits. At the same time, we will also expand service consumption and optimize the consumption structure; Innovatively organizing consumer expansion activities and creating a consumption atmosphere; Cultivate and strengthen new types of consumption, stimulate consumption vitality; Improve consumption conditions and optimize the consumption environment. Li Yongzhao emphasized that 2025 is the year when the 14th Five Year Plan comes to an end. The Ministry of Commerce will thoroughly implement the deployment of the Central Economic Work Conference, focus on stabilizing foreign trade, stabilizing foreign investment, expanding consumption, and expanding high-level opening up to the outside world. With the actual results of high-quality business development, it will make new contributions to promoting sustained economic recovery and improvement. (New Society)