China's recovery boosts global commerce

Despite the fact that exporters in many parts of the world are still struggling to secure a market share abroad, Xi'an-based Longi Green Energy Technology Co has been not only hiring but expanding its factories in recent weeks, said Zhong Baoshen, its chairman. Ideas for business expansion constantly pop up in his mind, he said.

The group, a major Chinese manufacturer of monocrystalline silicon photovoltaic products, saw its exports of photovoltaic units, mainly to Europe, jump 62.5 percent year-on-year to 3.9 gigawatts in the first half of this year, thanks to the gradual recovery of these markets.

Zhong predicted that the value of the company's exports will grow 50 percent year-on-year to 12 billion yuan this year.

The company currently is hiring 17,000 people for its overseas and domestic plants to meet the growing market demand. Its overall staff is likely to reach 51,000 next year.

The company operates a manufacturing base with over 4,000 employees in Malaysia. It plans to move to the next development stage by building more branches in other countries, including India, Australia and Brazil during the post-pandemic period, to further compete with other established rivals.

Bai Ming, a senior researcher at the China Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation in Beijing, said many countries' broken or shut industrial and supply chains pushed the rebound in China's export growth rate over the past two months. China's supportive trade policies, surging value of shipments to the ASEAN markets, and rapid export of anti-epidemic materials also boosted exports.

"Whether this momentum could be maintained in the future depends on the global community's efforts in containing the pandemic. If a second wave of the contagion occurs in China's major trading partners, it will delay their economic recovery and affect China's external demand," he said.

"China should seal more free trade deals with partner economies to put its trade growth on a firmer footing."

Gao Lingyun, a research fellow at the Institute of World Economics and Politics, which is part of the Beijing-based Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, warned that because of rising unilateralism, China must continue to upgrade of its trade structure, with its transition to high value-added trade such as high-tech manufacturing and services.

Since the pandemic has hit the economies of developing countries more severely than those of developed countries, trade between China and developing nations has also been damaged more than that between China and developed economies, Gao said.

So, China needs to stabilize trade ties with Africa and South America, as well as pay attention to the relocation of its labor-intensive industries to other markets in the next stage.

To help more export-oriented companies, the government announced in mid-August that it will step up credit support for foreign trade companies, especially micro, small and medium-sized ones, and extend financial support to major foreign-funded enterprises that are eligible for low-cost re-lending and rediscount quotas.

Under the new rule, foreign-funded companies are also entitled as domestic firms to the 1.5 trillion yuan re-lending and rediscount special quota support provided by the People's Bank of China, the central bank.

However, Ren Hongbin, assistant minister of commerce, talked of foreign trade environment turning even more complex and challenging in the second half of the year. As the pandemic is still raging worldwide, the resulting global economic contraction will squeeze external demand, he said at a national meeting on stabilizing the country's foreign trade.

The Ministry of Commerce found in a recent survey that insufficient orders, impeded logistics, financing difficulties and unstable industry and supply chains are prominent factors troubling foreign trade businesses.

A report released by the World Trade Organization in early August said that travel restrictions and border closures imposed by countries could account for a substantial increase in trade costs, besides causing considerable delays in international maritime and land transport.