Ministry of Commerce: In the first half of the year, China's support policies for service trade continued to show effectiveness. The "circle of friends" for service trade is expanding day by day. News | Trade | Services
On August 17th, Beijing, China Central Radio and Television Network reported that in the first half of 2023, China's overall service trade maintained stable growth, with a total import and export volume of RMB 3135.84 billion, a year-on-year increase of 8.5%, according to Shu Jueting, spokesperson for the Ministry of Commerce, at a regular press conference. Among them, knowledge intensive service trade accounted for 43.5%, an increase of 1.5 percentage points from the previous year, and the import and export of travel services increased by 65.4%, making it the fastest growing service trade sector.
Shu Jueting pointed out that the stable growth of service trade in the first half of the year was mainly due to three reasons:
One is that the support policies for service trade continue to show effectiveness. In recent years, the Ministry of Commerce has conscientiously implemented the decisions and deployments of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council, and jointly issued a series of policy measures to promote the development of service trade, including promoting innovative development of service trade, deepening the opening up of the service industry, accelerating the transformation and upgrading of service outsourcing, strengthening the construction of characteristic service export bases, and vigorously developing digital trade. Various regions have tailored measures to local conditions and actively introduced supporting measures. The implementation and effectiveness of these policy measures have effectively promoted the stable development of China's service trade.
Secondly, the foundation for the development of service trade has become more solid. Since the beginning of this year, the national economy has continued to recover steadily, and the service industry has maintained rapid growth. In the first half of the year, the added value of China's service industry was 33 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 6.4%, accounting for 56% of GDP, 1.6 percentage points higher than the same period last year. Its contribution rate to national economic growth was 66.1%, providing strong support for the stable growth of China's service trade.
Thirdly, the circle of friends in service trade is expanding day by day. In recent years, China's international cooperation in service trade has continued to deepen, with more than 200 countries and regions engaged in service trade with China, and signed memorandums of understanding on service trade cooperation with 15 countries. Since this year, the Ministry of Commerce has actively promoted and co built the "the Belt and Road" countries, BRICS countries, the SCO and other countries to strengthen service trade dialogue and exchange, promote the establishment of cooperation mechanisms with relevant countries, deepen cooperation with key countries, and the network of international cooperation in service trade has become increasingly perfect; We actively play the role of key exhibition platforms such as the China International Import Expo and the China International Fair for Trade in Services, providing international public goods and effective carriers for China to strengthen service trade cooperation with countries around the world.