Ministry of Commerce: Increase the Consumption of New Cars and Expand the Circulation of Second-hand Cars
On May 31, at the press conference of the National Development and Reform Commission's interpretation on the [State Council Printed and Issued a Package of Policies and Measures to Stabilize the Economy], in order to facilitate all sectors of society to better understand the situation, Mr. Zhao Chenxin, the Deputy Director of the National Development and Reform Commission, Ms. Xu Xiaolan, Vice Minister of Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Mr. Li Zhong, the Vice Minister of Human Resources and Social Security, Mr. Zhao Chongjiu, Vice Minister of Transport and Mr. Sheng Qiuping, Vice Minister of Commerce attended the press conference and answers the questions concerned by everyone. The following is the keynote speech of Sheng Qiuping, the Vice Minister of Commerce.
The automobile industry is a pillar industry of China’s national economy, and the automobile consumption accounts for a high proportion in the total social sales. It has a large growth space and has a strong driving effect. It’s the key field for expanding domestic demands and stimulating consumption. At present, vehicle holdings in China have reached 307 million vehicles, surpassing the United States and ranking the first place in the world. The vehicle sales account for 10% of the total social retail sales.
Since the beginning of this year, affected by factors such as the sporadic outbreak of the pandemic in multiple points and chips shortage, the growth of automobile consumption has been under pressure. In particular, the supply and demand of automobiles dropped sharply in April. The retail sales of automobiles above the designated size decreased by 31.6% on year-on-year basis, dragging down the monthly growth rate of total social retails by 2.7 percent on the year-on-year basis. The increase in automobile consumption plays a very important role in promoting the recovery of consumption and driving the sustainable development of the entire automobile industry chain.
The Party Central Committee and the State Council attach great importance to it. The General Office of the State Council issued the Opinions on Further Unleashing Consumption Potential and Promoting Sustainable Consumption Recovery in April, proposing a series of measures to promote automobile consumption. Recently, the executive conference of the State Council reviewed and approved a package of measures to stabilize the economy, stabilizing the bulk consumption such as automobile through policies. These measures are very timely and powerful and have greatly enhanced market confidence and are of great significance to boosting the automobile consumption.
Sheng Qiuping, the Vice Minister of Commerce, said: The Ministry of Commerce will conscientiously implement the decisions and deployments of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, and will work with relevant departments to introduce detailed implementation measures to promote the transformation of automobile purchase management to use management, ensure that relevant measures are implemented as soon as possible, and promote the stable and sustainable development of automobile market.
Two aspects should be focused on: firstly, stabilizing the increment and increasing the consumption of new cars; secondly, revitalizing the stock and expanding the circulation of used cars.
In new car consumption, the automobile circulation enterprises should be guided to make good use of the policy of reducing the purchase tax on passenger cars in stages, regions with conditions should be encouraged to carry out old for new service so as to expand the new cars sales. The purchase and use of new energy vehicles should be supported, break the local protection of the new energy vehicle market should be broken, new energy vehicle going rural activity should be carried out deeply, and the charging facilities construction should be actively supported. The whole vehicle import port area should be supported to carry out the parallel import business and improve the parallel import vehicle environmental protection information disclosure system.
In the second-hand car circulation, the canceling of unreasonable restrictions on second-hand car transactions shall be expedited, the policy of comprehensively canceling second-hand car relocation restrictions shall be strictly implemented, the further canceling of relocation restrictions shall be promoted, the administrative regulations on the second-hand car market entities registration, filing and vehicles transaction registration shall be improved, so that enterprises can carry out the second-hand car business conveniently, the commercialization and large-scale circulation of second-hand cars can be promoted and the stock of the automobile market can be revitalized.
Recently, every region has actively implemented the national layout to steadily increase automobile consumption. Some cities where vehicle purchase restrictions are implemented, such as Shanghai and Shenzhen, have increased the number of license plate index. Jilin, Chongqing and other places have introduced the measures such as subsidies for new car purchases, car trade-ins, support for new energy vehicle consumption and allowing pickup trucks to run in the cities. I believe, with the effective implementation of various relevant measures, the automobile consumption will continue to be stabilized and recovered, playing a positive role in stabilizing the macroeconomic market.(Source: China Automobile Dealers Association)
