As various places have successively entered the "two sessions" time, the economic "transcripts" of some trillion GDP cities in 2022 and the main goals of economic and social development in 2023 have been released.
The Paper reporters found that as of January 4th, trillion GDP cities such as Jinan, Qingdao, Changsha, Hefei, Zhengzhou, Fuzhou and Dongguan have published relevant data.
The Central Economic Work Conference held earlier pointed out that the foundation of China’s current economic recovery is still not solid, the triple pressures of demand contraction, supply shock and expected weakening are still relatively large, and the external environment is turbulent, which has deepened the impact on China’s economy. However, it should be noted that China’s economy has strong resilience, great potential and sufficient vitality, and the effects of various policies continue to appear. Next year’s economic operation is expected to rebound overall.
At the same time, the Central Economic Work Conference put "focusing on expanding domestic demand" as the first item of economic work in 2023, and emphasized that "restoring and expanding consumption should be given priority" and "government investment and policy incentives should be used to effectively promote investment in the whole society".
The reporter noted that among the trillion-GDP cities that have announced their growth targets in 2023, most of the GDP growth targets are lower than those in 2022, but they are all higher than the actual GDP growth rate in 2022; At the same time, expanding domestic demand and promoting consumption have become the top priority of many governments in 2023.
Fu Yifu, a senior researcher at Xingtu Financial Research Institute, told the The Paper that the setting of the local growth target for 2023 shows that on the one hand, local governments are optimistic about the economic recovery in 2023, but on the other hand, they are also facing some realistic pressures, which need to be constantly adapted and overcome.
The target of GDP growth in 2023 was finalized.
The Economic Blue Book: Analysis and Forecast of China’s Economic Situation in 2023, jointly published by the Institute of Quantitative and Technical Economics of China Academy of Social Sciences and Social Science Literature Publishing House on December 13th, 2022, predicts that China’s economy will grow by about 5.1% in 2023, showing a further recovery trend.
Yao Yang, president of the National Development Research Institute of Peking University, recently said that 5% is the bottom line for GDP growth in 2023.
Specific to the local level,Among the 24 trillion GDP cities, Jinan, Qingdao, Changsha, Hefei, Zhengzhou and Fuzhou have announced their GDP growth targets in 2023, with values ranging from 5.5% to 7%.Among them, Zhengzhou and Changsha are about 7% and 7% respectively, Hefei and Fuzhou are about 6.5% and 6.5% respectively, and Jinan and Qingdao are about 5.5% and 5.5% respectively. Except Jinan’s GDP growth target is the same as that of the previous year, the GDP growth targets of the other five cities in 2023 have been lowered compared with the previous year.
However, recovery is still the main theme of the economy in 2023. Compared with the actual performance of GDP in 2022, the goal for 2023 is still optimistic.
The data shows that in terms of the total regional GDP in 2022, Jinan is expected to exceed 1.2 trillion yuan, Qingdao is expected to exceed 1.5 trillion yuan, Hefei is expected to exceed 1.2 trillion yuan and Dongguan is expected to exceed 1.1 trillion yuan; From the perspective of GDP growth rate in 2022, Changsha is expected to increase by 4.8%, Hefei is expected to increase by about 3.6%, and Fuzhou is expected to increase by more than 5.2%, all of which are lower than the corresponding GDP growth targets of the three cities in 2023.
"Considering the low cardinal utility in 2022, and with the optimization and adjustment of epidemic prevention and control measures, the disturbance of the epidemic to the operation of all walks of life will be gradually eliminated. Efforts to restore the economy will definitely be the top priority in 2023, and more policies may be introduced to support it. Therefore, economic recovery is a high probability event, and the target for 2023 is a little higher than the actual growth rate in 2022." Fu Yifu said, but on the other hand, the growth target has been lowered compared with the previous year’s target. "This is the local consideration based on its own reality. The long-term impact of the three-year epidemic is easy to produce the so-called ‘ Scar effect ’ The negative impact on the urban economy is difficult to eliminate immediately, and an adaptation period is needed. "
At the same time, some cities have lowered the growth target of industrial added value. For example, Zhengzhou has set the target for 2023 at more than 8%, which is lower than the 10% growth target for 2022; Changsha set it above 8%, which is also lower than the growth target of 8.5% in the previous year; Hefei is set at more than 8%, which is lower than the target of more than 9% in the previous year. In addition, there is a slight change in Jinan’s expression. In 2023 and 2022, the expectation for the growth of this indicator is about 6% and above 6% respectively.
In addition, some of the above cities have also announced the growth targets of investment and consumption in 2023. Zhengzhou and Hefei set the growth target of fixed assets investment at 10% or above in 2023, including 15% in Zhengzhou and around 10% in Hefei, both higher than the previous year’s target. Changsha, Jinan, Qingdao and Fuzhou set the growth target of fixed assets investment at 6%-7% in 2023, among which Changsha is above 7%, Jinan is around 6.5%, Qingdao is around 6% and Fuzhou is 6%, all of which are lower than the target of last year.
Zhengzhou and Fuzhou set the growth target of total retail sales of social consumer goods at 10% or above in 2023, including 12% in Zhengzhou and 10% in Fuzhou, both of which were higher than the previous year’s target. The growth targets of total retail sales of social consumer goods in Hefei, Changsha, Jinan and Qingdao in 2023 range from 5% to 9%, among which Hefei is about 9%, Changsha is 7%, Jinan is about 5.5% and Qingdao is more than 5%. Except Hefei is the same as last year, the growth targets of the other three places are all lowered compared with last year.
Promoting consumption becomes the primary task of some cities
"Focus on expanding domestic demand" is the first item in the economic work in 2023 deployed by the Central Economic Work Conference, and it is mentioned that "the recovery and expansion of consumption should be given priority" and "the investment of the whole society should be effectively promoted through government investment and policy incentives."
The Outline of the Strategic Plan for Expanding Domestic Demand (2022-2035) issued in mid-December, 2022 clearly pointed out that in the future, the domestic market will dominate the national economic cycle more obviously, consumption has become the main driving force for China’s economic growth, and the optimization and upgrading of household consumption will be combined with modern technology and production methods, and China, the most promising consumer market in the world, will continue to grow and develop.
Wen Bin, chief economist of China Minsheng Bank, once wrote an analysis that looking forward to 2023, consumption will rebound obviously with the restoration of consumption scenes, the recovery of income growth, the introduction of policies to promote consumption and the low cardinal utility, and the annual growth is expected to be 9.0% year-on-year.
Judging from the published government work reports for 2023 in the aforementioned cities, many cities put expanding domestic demand, especially promoting consumption, in a prominent position.
Among the twelve key tasks deployed in Qingdao in 2023, "continuous efforts to expand domestic demand and steady growth" is the first, which requires giving full play to the basic role of consumption and the key role of investment, vigorously implementing the action of consumption expansion and upgrading, accelerating the implementation of major infrastructure investment projects, and continuously releasing the potential of domestic demand.
In the government work report, Qingdao particularly emphasized consumption, clearly introduced and implemented policies and measures to boost contact consumption, and accelerated the recovery of cultural tourism, accommodation and catering, wholesale and retail industries.
Among the nine major tasks of Fuzhou in 2023, "persisting in expanding domestic demand" is also the first one, which requires strengthening the endogenous driving force of economic development, including accelerating consumption upgrading, giving play to the key role of investment and promoting regional coordinated development.
Among the eight key tasks deployed by Hefei in 2023, in the first item, "Greater efforts to promote high-quality economic development", it is clearly proposed to develop and expand market players, fully expand effective investment, accelerate the recovery of consumption, and strengthen the support of factors. In promoting consumption, Hefei said that it should give priority to restoring and expanding consumption, comprehensively improve the consumption level, and strive to become an international consumption center city.
In the second item of ten key tasks in 2023, "Focus on maintaining stable economic growth and accelerating the improvement of quality and efficiency of development", Jinan proposed to continuously expand project investment, improve the quality and efficiency of attracting investment, promote the recovery and expansion of consumption, promote the incremental improvement of foreign trade and accelerate the development of private economy.
"Expansion needs to focus on the role of consumption." Fu Yifu said that compared with investment, the consumption performance in 2022 is relatively low, in other words, there is more room for growth in future consumption. However, the biggest problem that restricts the release of residents’ consumption potential at present lies in the lack of residents’ consumption confidence. "The root of the lack of confidence lies in the damage to the balance sheets of many families caused by the epidemic." Therefore, repairing household balance sheets and boosting consumer confidence are the key points that need to be broken through. In this regard, we must first stabilize employment and let more people have a stable source of income. Secondly, in the long run, we must focus on promoting the reform of the income distribution system of residents, narrowing the income gap of residents, optimizing the consumption environment, solving the pain points of consumption, and promoting the release of domestic demand.
The construction of modern industrial system has its own emphasis.
Accelerating the construction of a modern industrial system is the second item in the economic work in 2023 arranged by the Central Economic Work Conference.
In this regard, Changsha, Hefei, Qingdao, Jinan, Fuzhou and other cities have layouts, but the emphasis is different.
Changsha focuses on the advanced manufacturing industry, and requires the in-depth implementation of the "Thousands of Hundreds" project of industrial development, upgrading and upgrading the "1+2+N" advanced manufacturing industrial cluster, accelerating the research and development and application promotion of cutting-edge technologies such as new energy, high-end equipment and artificial intelligence, and promoting the high-end, intelligent and green development of manufacturing industry.
Hefei puts "accelerating the development of new industrial integration clusters" as the first item of "building a modern industrial system with higher quality", and proposes to enhance the service efficiency of "chain length system", optimize the layout of "16+N" key industrial chains, accelerate the expansion of three industrial clusters of new display, integrated circuit and artificial intelligence, and strive to become the second batch of new industrial clusters of national war.
Qingdao proposes to promote the expansion and upgrading of advantageous industries, the development of emerging industrial clusters, the forward-looking layout of future industries, and the optimization and upgrading of modern service industries, and continuously improve the resilience and safety level of 24 key industrial chains.
Jinan emphasizes "persisting in the strategy of strengthening the city through industry", and demands that the high-quality development of manufacturing industry should be taken as the main direction and the three-year action of accelerating the construction of a strong city through industry should be implemented.
Fuzhou emphasizes developing modern agriculture with characteristics, promoting new industrialization, improving the "four major economies" and building a new system of modern service industry.