The uphill battle consumers are struggling to win

All these emergency measures will more or less have an impact on some consumers' purchasing power and thus their confidence.

If robust consumption growth is needed to offset the slowing of investment- and export-led growth, policymakers have to come up with more pro-consumer tax and fiscal incentives to bolster consumer confidence.

Equally important for the government is the need to intensify efforts to improve the environment for people to save, spend or invest as they become more selective than ever. In this regard, it was a welcome change to hear Shanghai Stock Exchange saying on Monday that it had, for the first time, delisted a company for breaching the information disclosure rules. So is the news of the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio and Television suspending the distribution license of a company accused of fraudulently boosting by millions of dollars the box office returns of a martial arts movie.

But much more needs to be done to end the frauds that have been violating Chinese consumers' rights and weakening their confidence.

The McKinsey report has rightly pointed out that understanding and responding to the changes in consumers' spending habits will be decisive in determining the companies, domestic and overseas, that win or lose.

But for that to happen, policymakers must do more to enable consumers to spend with confidence.

The author is a senior writer with China Daily. zhuqiwen@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 03/26/2016 page5)