CNR:
Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are the backbone for national economic and social development. In recent years, our country has introduced a series of policies and measures to support SMEs. Could you please elaborate on the efforts made by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) in this regard during the 13th Five-Year Plan period? Have those supportive measures been effective? What measures will the MIIT adopt to further promote the healthy development of SMEs? Thank you.
Wang Zhijun:
Thank you for your questions. While attaching great importance to large-scale leading enterprises, such as CRRC, China Mobile and Huawei, we should pay equal attention to the large number of micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs). MSMEs are: a primary contributor to national economic and social development; an important source of technological innovation; and provide vital support to expanding job opportunities and improving people's livelihoods. Promoting the development of SMEs is hugely important to ensure stability on six fronts (employment, the financial sector, foreign trade, foreign investment , domestic investment, and expectations) and maintain security in six areas (job security, basic living needs, operations of market entities, food and energy, stable industrial and supply chains, and the normal functioning of primary-level governments).
The State Council has established a leading group on promotion of the development of SMEs, and its office is located in the MIIT. During the 13th Five-Year Plan period, the MIIT has earnestly performed the duties of the office, played its full part in its coordinating role, and made solid progress in promoting the development of SMEs. In general, we have concentrated our efforts on the following three aspects during the 13th Five-Year Plan period, and tangible results have been achieved.
First, we have promoted the establishment of systems to provide legal and policy support to SMEs. The business environment is crucial to enterprises, while a complete system of relevant laws and regulations plays a very important role in creating a business environment conducive to the regular operation of enterprises. Currently, after years of effort, a system of supportive laws and regulations has taken shape at national level, which consists of "one law, one regulation and two guidelines." "One law" refers to the Law of the People's Republic of China on Promoting Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises, which was amended in 2017. The MIIT had taken part in the entire process of the law amendment and carried out an inspection on the law enforcement last year together with the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress in order to promote the implementation of the law. "One regulation" refers to a newly-released regulation on ensuring timely payments to SMEs. The regulation is very important. It is a concrete measure to implement the law on promoting SMEs and enhance the protection of the rights and interests of SMEs. In fact, many countries have similar laws and regulations. "Two guidelines" are respectively the guideline on promoting the healthy development of SMEs issued by the General Office of the CPC Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council in 2019, and the guideline on improving systems for providing support to SMEs released by 17 government departments, including the MIIT and the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) this year. The two guidelines focus on solving major problems SMEs are facing right now and push forward the building of a regular and long-term mechanism to promote the development of SMEs.
Second, we have promoted the specialization of SMEs. The specialization of enterprises, especially of SMEs, represents a general trend across the globe. The efforts made by China in this regard mainly include improving the systems for cultivating SMEs in a phased manner to cultivate outstanding SMEs. 27 competent authorities nationwide in provincial regions, including municipalities with independent planning authority with a high level of industrial development and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, issued methods for defining cultivation of outstanding SMEs. Enterprise cultivation centers have been established in 29 provincial regions, nurturing more than 60,000 SMEs. At present, more than 20,000 enterprises have been defined as outstanding SMEs at provincial level. The MIIT released the first batch of 248 "little giant enterprises" at national level. They were selected from among the outstanding SMEs. Each of them focuses on a market niche and masters key technologies and has a strong innovative capacity and a big market share. The ministry is now organizing the cultivation of the second batch of "little giant enterprises."
Third, continue improving the public service system for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). SMEs are not as strong as large companies and require assistance and support in the public service sectors. The MIIT has cultivated and identified 657 national public service-based demonstration platforms designated for SMEs and 329 national entrepreneurship and innovation-oriented demonstration bases for small- and micro-sized enterprises. Over 3,600 provincial-level demonstration platforms and more than 2,400 provincial-level entrepreneurship and innovation demonstration bases for micro firms have been established. We support 101 real-economy development zones in developing integrated large-, medium- and small-sized enterprise accommodation carriers with distinctive features and promote more than 100,000 service sectors to offer good and convenient services forSMEs. Meanwhile, we have entrusted third party organizations to conduct development environment assessments of SMEs, to ensure an optimized growth environment.
Next, we will strengthen our efforts to actively cooperate with members of the State Council Leading Group for Promoting the Development of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises and carry out policies to ensure that SMEs are innovation-oriented and of high quality. Thank you.
