F REIGN TRADE - 中国国际贸易促进委员会

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reserves are expected to be used by the
new office.
The foreign exchange administration
said its co-financing office will
respect “market choice” and promote
“fair play”, according to a statement on
its website.
The operations have “promoted
China’s economic and social development,
expanded the scope of investment
and the fields of foreign exchange reserves
and promoted a diversified management
approach,” said the agency.
China to cut farm produce
distribution costs
The State Council, China’s cabinet,
recently issued a circular asking local authorities
to ensure the implementation of a
range of measures aimed at cutting logistics
costs for farm produce amid climbing
food prices, according to Xinhua.
The measures include lowering
electricity and water usage fees for
those engaged in the production and
distribution of farm produce, cutting administrative
fees at markets, facilitating
the transportation of farm produce and
reducing taxes on major products.
The recent policy came amid rising
farm produce prices in China. The new
pricing systems for electricity and water
usage should be implemented before
June 30 this year, the circular said.
“China’s foreign trade to improve this year”
China’s foreign trade
for 2013 will be better
than that of last year
despite uncertainties,
General Administration
of Customs spokesman
Zheng Yuesheng was
cited as saying by Xinhua
on January 10.
He said global economies
have launched stimulus
policies to prevent
growth rates from slumping,
adding that China’s domestic efforts to boost the growth of foreign trade
will have more visible effects this year.
“U.S. should not blame trade deficit on China’s
currency policy”
The so-called Chinese “currency manipulation” is some Americans’
favorite scapegoat for the United States’ large trade deficit and anemic job
growth, but export growth is actually determined primarily by factors other
than exchange rates, Edward Lazear, former chairman of the U.S. President’s
Council of Economic Advisers, was quoted as saying by Xinhua.
When things are not going well, it is common to seek scapegoats. In this
vein, populists of various stripes allege that China manipulates the value of its
currency to favor its exports and undercut American workers, particularly in
manufacturing, noted Lazear.
“The reality is that the value of China’s yuan in terms of dollars is not the
major reason why China exports over three times as much to us as we do to
them. Its exchange rate is a minor source of weak U.S. job growth,” Lazear
wrote in an article on The Wall Street Journal.
10%
China’s industrial
value-added
output rose 10 percent
year on year
in 2012, down 3.9
percentage points
from the growth
rate a year earlier,
the NBS said.
6.8%
China, the world’s second-largest
oil consumer, imported
271 million tonnes of
crude oil last year, a rise of
6.8 percent year on year.
3.7%
Foreign direct investment
in China in 2012 declined 3.7
percent year-on-year to $111.72
billion, the Ministry of Commerce
said.
11.2%
China collected 11.07 trillion
yuan ($1.76 trillion) in
taxation last year, an increase
of 11.2 percent year on year, the
State Administration of Taxation
data showed.
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