State economic planner releases action plan to increase consumption

A series of measures to increase domestic consumption were released by the National Development and Reform Commission at Tuesday's economic working conference which vowed to push for high-quality economic growth.

The measures cover sectors such as automobiles, home appliances, the 5G high speed network, urban properties as well as improving the environment for consumption.

The joint action plan was released in collaboration with 10 government agencies including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Civil Affairs, Ministry of Transportation and the State Administration for Market Regulation.

“The general consumption upgrade trend is still robust despite slight turbulence last year,” NDRC inspector Liu Yunan said. “Consumer sentiment is slightly dampened due to rising debt ratio and stock market fluctuations.”

It will also encourage trading up home appliances to boost sales of new products.

Consumption contributed as much as 76.2 percent to last year’ GDP growth, adding 18.6 percentage points from a year ago, as economic growth now relies less on investment-driven projects.

More resources will be allocated to nursing homes and care institutions as well as renovating the homes of the aged.

Government bodies will work to make agricultural products more easily available to urban consumers. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology will also speed up the commercialization of the 5G network and will launch trial operations in several cities. This will lay the groundwork for the official commercial layout of the high-speed network, which will create new development opportunities for chip makers, handset makers as well as software developers.

Commerce Ministry’s head of market operations Wang Bin said the consumption upgrade trend would continue for the next few years, with property and transportation consumption still making up the majority of consumer spending.

Demand for high quality goods, as well as service expenditure is still on the rise.

Last year, service spending make up 49.5 percent of total consumer expenditure.