N Video at Southern Metropolis Daily:

You just mentioned the need to further promote the development of a unified national market, which is a key support for smooth domestic circulation and has attracted a lot of interest from all sectors of society. How is this work progressing? And what are the next steps for further advancing this? Thank you.

Wang Changlin:

I would like to invite Mr. Wang to answer your questions.

Wang Renfei:

Thank you for your questions. Building a unified national market is a major decision made by the CPC Central Committee. Over the years, all relevant parties have earnestly implemented the plans of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, and positive results have been achieved in the development of a unified national market. To summarize, I believe the work can be examined from three aspects. First, social consensus has been markedly strengthened. The concept of a unified national market has taken root among the people, and the initiative and enthusiasm of all parties to integrate into and contribute to the development of a unified national market have been significantly enhanced. Second, the basic framework of the market has basically taken shape, the foundational market institutions have been continuously strengthened, market infrastructure has been steadily improved, and the flow of factors of production has become smoother. Third, the effects of the development are becoming increasingly visible. The market, as the scarcest resource, is being fully leveraged. And the unified national market is playing a growing role in pooling resources, driving growth, stimulating innovation, expanding domestic demand and promoting competition. I will give you three sets of figures: First, from January to November last year, the sales revenue of interprovincial trade accounted for 41.1% of national sales revenue, an increase of 0.8 percentage point year on year. Second, the electricity volume of interprovincial transactions accounted for 24% of the national market-based electricity volume, an increase of 1 percentage point year on year. Third, in the first three quarters of last year, the ratio of China's total social logistics costs to GDP was 14%, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point year on year. These "two increases and one decrease" reflect, from some perspectives, that our factor resources are being optimized on a larger scale and that market transaction costs are continuously decreasing.

The Central Economic Work Conference incorporated the in-depth advancement of a unified national market into the overall requirements of this year's economic work, further highlighting the extreme importance of this work. We understand that next, the key is to make all-out efforts in deepening progress.

First, we will push forward the deepening of institutional development. In summary, it can be described as "one regulation, two lists and three systems." One regulation refers to studying and formulating the regulation for the development of a unified national market to strengthen legal safeguards. Two lists refer to formulating and issuing a list of items that hinder the development of a unified national market and a list of items that are encouraged and prohibited in attracting investment, thereby clarifying what local governments can and cannot do in promoting economic development. The three systems refer to improving the statistical, fiscal and taxation, and assessment systems that are conducive to developing a unified national market, and to improving the incentive and restraint mechanisms. By improving the rules and regulations, we can further guide all regions and departments to firmly ensure that local concerns yield to the overall situation, minor principles yield to major ones, and smaller markets yield to the service of the unified national market.

Second, we will make further progress in empowering high-quality development. To implement the basic requirements of "five unifications and one openness," we will promote breakthroughs in the unified market across the four major areas of electricity, transportation, technology and data, and introduce a series of high-value policies and measures to make the development of a unified market more tangible and perceptible to enterprises and the public, better leverage the advantages of a super-large-scale market, and strongly support the building of a robust domestic market and high-quality economic development.

Third, we will make further progress in eradicating deep-rooted problems. Adhering to a problem-oriented approach, we will focus on key issues such as disorderly low-price competition among enterprises, local government procurement and bidding, and investment promotion and business attraction. We will improve the four working mechanisms of problem identification, clue verification, supervision and rectification, and interviews and notifications. We will resolutely remove obstacles and bottlenecks that hinder the development of a unified national market, dismantle local protectionism and market fragmentation, and thereby ensure that the unified national market becomes a fair stage for all types of business entities to compete. Thank you.