Recently, Opinions of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on Accelerating the Construction of a Unified National Market were officially issued, clearly proposing to break the key blockages that restrict the economic cycle to promote the smooth flow of commodity factor resources in a wider scope.
Building a unified national market is to better integrate into global integration. In dialectical terms, it is part of the domestic circulation but also contributes to international circulation.
Reviewing Dongguan’s data in the first quarter of this year, we can find that the domestic and international factors reinforce each other and mutually converge, which is an important reason why Dongguan’s economy gives priority to stability and pursuing progress based on stability. We learned from the interview that, under the current impact beyond expectations, Dongguan’s domestic enterprises seize the opportunity, foreign-funded enterprises are busy increasing investment and expansion; foreign trade structure is optimizing and promoting the growth of domestic trade through e-commerce platform online. In the context of poor logistics, Dongguan actively increases domestic trade routes, to promote “port to port” transport, increasing the full convergence and dual circulation.
▲Dust-free production workshops of BrosMed
Keywords: domestic investment and foreign investment
Domestic investment is seizing the opportunities and foreign investment is busy increasing investment and production
LINK CONCEPT ELECTRONICS, a Hong Kong-funded enterprise, is a high-tech enterprise in Dongguan. The reporter saw the machines were roaring and the workers were busy in an orderly manner. The enterprise is mainly engaged in the manufacturing and research and development of cell phone components, with a leading level of technological development and production capacity. In 2021, its revenue reached 1.7 billion yuan. This year, the enterprise will continue to strengthen scientific and technological innovation, speed up equipment automation transformation and expand production scale.
“Dongguan government lent us a land, which is located in Dalingshan. And we had signed an investment agreement on April 6, planning to invest 1.2 billion yuan in a new plant to meet our own development needs.” Liang Liguang, deputy general manager of the enterprise, said.
The foreign enterprises continue to invest in Dongguan, bringing a warm spring breeze to the world economy. In January 2022, Dongguan uses foreign investment to make a good start, with the city’s utilized foreign capital increasing by 17.35% year-on-year, an increase higher than the national average. Over the past year, the figure increased by 19.7% year-on-year, the highest record in nearly three years.
Dongguan is launching more policies under the current impact beyond expectations. Since the outbreak of Covid-19, Dongguan has upgraded its service for foreign enterprises, such as promoting the kicking-off day, breaking barriers, supplying, expanding the market, supporting the model innovation in traditional foreign investment and foreign trade, expanding new growth of foreign investment and foreign trade, and supporting micro and small enterprises...... During the pandemic, a series of foreign trade stabilization measures are launched, to help enterprises increase confidence and increase their investment.
According to the Dongguan Investment Promotion Bureau, since this year, the Bureau has established an enterprises library of about 1,300 enterprises for investment increase and expansion, and collected about 200 projects with initial intention, with an intended investment amount of more than 70 billion yuan.
As with foreign enterprises, domestic enterprises also have strong resilience. According to the data for the first quarter of this year, the added value of Dongguan domestic enterprises in the first quarter reached 71.577 billion yuan, an increase of 4.6%, accounting for 62.0% of the city’s above-scale industrial value added, higher than the growth of added value with Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan invested enterprises (2.8%) and the growth of value added by foreign-invested enterprises (0.5%).
The reporter also found that many domestic enterprises buck the trend.
“We expect to grow by 40% in the first quarter, and we would have done better without the impact of the pandemic,” said Li Bin, chairman of BrosMed Medical Co., Ltd. And Dongguan HCP Technology feels the same. “In the first quarter of this year, our sales fell short of expectations and were only 60% of the original plan. But the whole year’s sales are still expected to double compared to last year, which will be 700 million to 1 billion yuan.” The official introduced.
Their growth against the trend under the pandemic is due to their absolute leading edge in technology. “We can say that our technology is leading the world. In the last three years, 12% of our sales were invested in research and development. In addition, we also have the products with a cost advantage.” Li Bin said. According to reports, BrosMed has more than 30 product lines and more than two hundred product registration certificates worldwide. Likewise, HCP Technology has now received more than 200 patents for its self-developed products, of which the self-developed international transfer equipment leads the industry with a speed of 2 million chips per hour.
Both companies are confident about the future. Now, BrosMed is not only speeding up production but also increasing its investment and production, while HCP Technology is also trying to make great progress in the second quarter.
Keywords: domestic trade and foreign trade
Optimizing foreign trade structure, using the online measure to promote the growth of domestic trade
Foreign trade is the lifeline of Dongguan. During the pandemic, Dongguan’s foreign trade structure is further optimized, for instance, an increase in the proportion of general trade, the fast growth of market procurement, double-digit growth of private enterprises in export, and overall growth of foreign-funded enterprises in import and export.
People familiar with Dongguan’s foreign trade know that processing trade is one of the important driving forces behind Dongguan’s economic growth. But in recent years, with the acceleration of transformation and upgrading, Dongguan’s foreign trade is constantly climbing in terms of the value chain, and general trade has been in the top position. In the first quarter of this year, Dongguan’s general trade import and export grow slightly (2.6%), also ranking first in the share of Dongguan’s foreign trade import and export value.
In addition, some seemingly unpopular foreign trade industries are silently contributing to Dongguan’s GDP. For example, in the first quarter, the market procurement trade model played an important role in Dongguan’s stable foreign trade. Dongguan market procurement exports 5.75 billion yuan, a surge of 215.1% in one quarter.
The reporter learned that many Dongguan enterprises have enjoyed the benefit of the market procurement export model. “We have a variety of goods with small quantity and many varieties. It’s time-consuming and laborious if taking the general trade export mode. The market procurement export model is more suitable for us. Our export in the first two months of this year grows by 155.1% compared to the same period last year.” Liang Lifang, an official of Choebe (Dongguan) Packaging Co., Ltd. said. Due to the pandemic and the lack of containers, our company changed the solution, enlarging the company’s market procurement trade exports to nearly 30% of all export business.
In the first quarter, although there was a decline in imports and exports of Dongguan private enterprises, its export had a double-digit growth (12.8%); foreign-invested enterprises though have a decline in export, but the overall import and export growth increased by 2.9%. All these show that Dongguan’s foreign trade still has a strong resilience.
More surprisingly, enterprises that were familiar with foreign export now are actively integrating the “dual circulation”. Various foreign trade enterprises also start live commerce, directly promoting the growth of Dongguan’s domestic trade.
In Shijie town, Guan Weiliang, marketing director of Dongguan XingChi sewing equipment co., ltd., is focusing on live commerce. “A few days ago, we renewed our contract with the e-commerce platform and invested another 500,000 yuan to add new stores on the platform, while bidding for attracting projects,” Guan said the strategy transformation was initially proposed by the end of 2020. Because they found that the online sale increased over tenfold over the last year when reviewing the annual sales. So they realized to transfer to online commerce, finding a second curve in an uncertain context.
In Zhangmutou town, Yan Youchun, director of Guangdong Luoman Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd., put his growth hope on the 13th Canton Fair in April this year. “Before the opening, we have communicated with our clients in advance that we have two Livestream per day after the opening. On that day, many clients enter our live room.” Yan kept his eyes on the data online on that day.
In Dalang town, hundreds of clothes were hung in the marketing center of Dongguan Yaqi Garments Co., Ltd. and two live streamers are selling products through Livestream before the computer. “we are trying to complete the orders in the last quarter within this month.” said Liu Jianbo, the general manager. The Covid-19 has an impact on its production and business development to some extent, and they have to complete the orders.
▲Luoman is introducing products to customers at home and abroad
Keywords: domestic and international circulation
Promoting the full integration of domestic and international circulation and the “port to port” transport
Though Dongguan’s decline in foreign trade, its foreign trade structure is further optimized with a key factor of stable logistics.
On April 2, the first Sino-Vietnamese special train cooperated by Guangdong Hua Wei Modern Logistics Co., Ltd. and San-Xin International Logistics Company, slowly departed from Changsheng freight station in Changping, Dongguan. “Due to the epidemic prevention and control reasons, the cargo on the China-Vietnam road can’t leave the country, so the operation of the China-Vietnam train will play an important role in trade exports.” He Ling, chairman of Guangdong Hua Wei Modern Logistics Co., Ltd, said.
This special train is of great significance to improve the ratio of “transporting Dongguan products from Dongguan” and keep the outbound logistics channel of “made in Dongguan” clear. Especially now the lack the container in the sea and air transport due to the Covid-19, the Sino-Asia, Sino-Europe, and Sino-Vietnam trains operated by the company played an important role in stabilizing Dongguan’s foreign trade.
As the proverb says, all roads lead to Rome.
Due to the pandemic, unsmooth logistics, and affected international circulation, Dongguan actively explores the domestic circulation, including increasing the domestic trade routes and promoting “port to port” transport to increase the integration of domestic and international circulation.
“Now we have shifted to water transport. For example, we pick up the goods in Hong Kong today and can deliver them to the factory tomorrow night or the morning the day after tomorrow. Compared to land transport, water transport is safer and more stable. So we will choose water transport as a long-term solution for foreign trade transport.” Bu Jing, Logistics Manager of UTAC SEMICONDUCTOR(Dongguan) Co., Ltd. said that “port to port” mode helps them a lot.
UTAC is a foreign-funded enterprise for producing and selling semiconductors, with export markets in ASEAN countries, mostly in Vietnam. “If we don’t take water transport, our goods can’t reach Vietnam, and we will lose more than ten million for one cubic meter of goods.” Bu Jing said, the company has now all turned to water transport, with a daily export volume of 3-4 containers and stable logistics.
According to Huangpu Customs, Dongguan has now more than 1,000 enterprises successfully using water transport. As of April 22, a total of 680 trips have been made on the Guanghang water transport line, with more than 320,000 tons of imported and exported goods, shifting from 3 trips per week to “daily trips”, and the current average daily frequency has reached 12. It plays a great role in the recovery of foreign trade.
Data shows that during the “13th Five-Year Plan” period, Dongguan Port has opened 72 routes, including 48 domestic trade routes, 11 foreign trade routes, 3 auto ro-ro routes, and 10 Bay Area Express routes.
In addition to the “port to port” mode, since the first quarter of this year, Dongguan Port also added four new European and American charter routes: the Liverpool route, the United States Portland route, and the United States Hueneme route, and Los Angeles route. Now, 17 charter routes have been launched, connecting with the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, and more than 10 countries. A total of 70 voyages and 600,000 TEU of cargo exports have been completed to ensure the stability of foreign trade logistics between Dongguan and European and American countries.
As the outbreak comes under control in this initial stage, Dongguan is stepping up the layout of the “land, water and air” integrated foreign trade logistics model. In addition to water transport, Dongguan is also the first city to carry out a cross-border air-sea intermodal transport model, transferring the security inspection, tying, assembly and other core links Hong Kong International Airport to the Dongguan port, to provide efficient services for foreign trade logistics.
Planner: Lei Shipeng, Yu Qingping
Executer: Yin Changsheng, Sun Benyuan
Author: Cao Lijuan
Picture: Zheng Zhibo
Editor: Zhang Ye
