Steady, smooth and excellent, Xinjiang's foreign trade grows strongly
Pomegranate Cloud/Xinjiang Daily reporter Chen Qiangwei Urumqi Customs released statistics on September 11, showing that in August, Xinjiang's foreign trade continued to maintain rapid growth despite the epidemic, achieving a total import and export value of 30.1 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 119.3%, higher than the national The growth rate was 110.7 percentage points, a record high monthly import and export, and the growth rate ranked second in the country. In the face of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the growth rate of Xinjiang's foreign trade has increased instead of falling, and the growth rate ranks among the top in the country. How should we view this phenomenon? What is the development logic behind the growth of Xinjiang's foreign trade? Stability: The coordinated development of northern and southern Xinjiang Since the beginning of this year, in the face of the complex and severe foreign trade development environment, the autonomous region has effectively coordinated epidemic prevention and control and economic and social development, and has continued to issue a series of policies to stabilize foreign trade to promote the stability and improvement of foreign trade. In the first eight months, the total value of Xinjiang's foreign trade import and export was 145.58 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 49.6%, 39.5 percentage points higher than the national average growth rate over the same period, and the growth rate ranked third in the country. Among them, the export value of Xinjiang was 120.94 billion yuan, an increase of 58.2% year-on-year, 44 percentage points higher than the national growth rate; the import value was 24.64 billion yuan, an increase of 18% year-on-year, 12.8 percentage points higher than the national growth rate. On September 7, Khunjerab Customs officers inspected and released materials. Correspondent Su Lishe "It can be seen from the data of the first eight months that the growth of foreign trade in a single month against the epidemic in August is a manifestation of the achievements of the autonomous region's adoption of a series of policies to stabilize foreign trade and ensure smooth flow this year, and it is the inevitable result of the accumulation of foreign trade this year." Deputy Customs of Urumqi Chief Wu Wei said. Xinjiang's foreign trade data also released a more important signal. In the first eight months, 10 prefectures and cities in northern Xinjiang, including Urumqi, Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture, and Bortala Mongolian Autonomous Prefecture, were still the main force in Xinjiang's foreign trade. The foreign trade of Kashgar, Aksu, Hotan and Bayingoleng Mongolian Autonomous Prefecture, which are located in southern Xinjiang, increased significantly, with the import and export value increasing by 81.5%, 62.1%, 39.2% and 57.1% respectively year-on-year. "Generally speaking, the foreign trade of northern and southern Xinjiang has shown a coordinated development trend." Wu Wei said that compared with the previous data, the foreign trade of southern Xinjiang continued to exert its strength, accounting for the proportion of the total import and export value of Xinjiang, which increased from 24.9% in the previous July to 24.9% in the previous July. 25.6% in the first eight months. Looking at this data in the overall development process of Xinjiang's foreign trade in the past two years, it shows the fact that the foreign trade of southern Xinjiang is growing rapidly and the difference between the foreign trade of northern and southern Xinjiang is shrinking, which is of great significance. Chang: The ports should be opened as much as possible. Xinjiang is a major port province, and 17 ports have been built and opened to the outside world. These ports are the advantages of Xinjiang's foreign trade development, and also the window for the country to open up the logistics channel to the west. In the marshalling yard of Alashankou Station, there are China-Europe trains waiting to depart. Photo by Correspondent Chen Gan On September 10, a "Yuxin-Europe" China-Europe train loaded with auto parts, electronic products, and clothing department stores left the country via Alashankou Station and headed to Malaszewicz Station in Poland. This day happened to be a full year when the Alashankou Port opened the railway entry and exit express customs clearance business. Xu Yueheng, deputy chief of the second section of Alashankou Customs Supervision, said that under the "railway express" mode, the overall customs clearance time for a single train at the port is reduced by an average of 4 hours, which saves operating costs for enterprises. The autonomous region has always attached great importance to port epidemic prevention and security. The Commerce Department of the Autonomous Region, Urumqi Customs and other 8 departments have carried out a survey on the full coverage of foreign trade guarantees at 17 ports, and proposed 21 measures that can be implemented. In and out, fast in and out. All parts of Xinjiang have overcome difficulties, strengthened daily monitoring and early warning of port operations, extended port operation time, and improved port operation efficiency. In the first eight months, the total volume of import and export freight by rail, road and air totaled 18.7623 million tons, an increase of 30.3% compared with the same period in 2019. Among them, the import and export freight volume of railway ports increased by 41.2% compared with the same period in 2019. Alashankou and Khorgos railway ports passed 8,701 China-Europe (Central Asia) trains, a year-on-year increase of 6.5% and a record high. Excellent: Steady optimization of foreign trade structure "Xinjiang's foreign trade shows significant growth in trade in traditional markets and emerging markets, multiple trade methods and platforms for opening up to the outside world continue to make efforts, private enterprises have a strong supporting role in Xinjiang's foreign trade development, and commodity structure has been steadily optimized." Wu Wei said. In the first eight months, China’s Xinjiang’s import and export value to the five Central Asian countries was 111.16 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 54.7%, accounting for 76.4% of Xinjiang’s total foreign trade import and export value in the same period; the import and export value to countries along the “Belt and Road” was 132.13 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase. An increase of 54.7%, accounting for 90.8% of the total value of Xinjiang's foreign trade import and export; the value of imports and exports to RCEP (Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership) countries increased by 27.1% year-on-year. From the data of the first eight months, Xinjiang's exports are mainly concentrated in labor-intensive products and mechanical and electrical products, which together account for 82.6% of the total value of Xinjiang's foreign trade exports. Benefiting from the growing demand in Europe and other markets and the development of the Central Asian market by enterprises, the new energy industry continues to maintain a good momentum of rapid export growth. "In particular, the export of new energy commodities such as lithium batteries, electric manned vehicles, and solar cells has grown significantly." Wu Wei said that new energy and high value-added products in export commodities have begun to increase, which reflects the development achievements of Xinjiang's new energy industry. The autonomous region continues to cultivate open platforms such as 4 comprehensive bonded zones and 8 national foreign trade transformation and upgrading bases, giving full play to the function of comprehensive bonded zones in cultivating and expanding export-oriented industrial clusters. In the first eight months, the total import and export of Kashgar, Alashankou, Horgos, and Urumqi Comprehensive Bonded Zone totaled 43.06 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 406.1%, accounting for 29.6% of Xinjiang's total foreign trade import and export value. Since the beginning of this year, the autonomous region has continued to optimize the business environment, and policy dividends have been continuously released, activating the endogenous driving force for enterprise development. In the first eight months, the import and export value of private enterprises was 130.94 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 59.8%, accounting for 89.9% of the total value of Xinjiang's foreign trade import and export during the same period. The supporting role of private enterprises in Xinjiang's foreign trade development is prominent. The growth rate of the import and export value of foreign-invested enterprises also increased significantly, up 82.9% year-on-year.