Chen Deming: Stimulate domestic demand through foreign demand

Chinese Minister of Commerce Chen Deming has proposed stimulating domestic demand through foreign demand. China should actively expand its share in the world market, promoting employment and increasing income through foreign demand, so as to boost domestic demand and consumption.

Chen wrote in the latest issue of the Qiushi Journal that, in a sense, stabilizing foreign demand means stabilizing domestic demand. Employment and laborers' incomes at home can also be stabilized through stabilizing foreign demand. This will help to strengthen purchasing power for the expansion of domestic demand, end consumption, and at the same time help increase investment opportunities.

Although the world's process of further opening-up and globalization will face setbacks, international trade will still grow faster than the world economy in general. In addition, western developed countries are losing or withdrawing from some export markets, while the economic stimulus plans of all countries are helping to create new markets.

Chen Deming noted that it is still appropriate for the trade of Chinese goods and services to gradually increase to around 15-20 percent of the world total. At present, China's goods trade makes up less than 9 percent of the world total, and its services trade accounts for less than 4 percent.

At this time, if we can take prompt steps according to circumstances, speed up the pace of 'going global' and promote the export of domestically-made products, in particular electromechanical devices, with 'going global' policies, we can fully lay a solid foundation for the expansion of the international market in the long run. These efforts will also achieve remarkable results in stimulating employment and domestic demand in the short term, said Chen.

He also believes that losses incurred from trade protectionist policies will outweigh any gains.

Source: People's Daily Online