All governments have been continuously optimizing the business environment in 2024 to promote the implementation of reforms and address new situations and problems faced by the development of the private economy so as to boost their confidence and develop the private economy.
Governments at all levels make great efforts to optimize the business environment.
Government service system in Anhui Province has been accelerating establishment which offers the best policies, the most competitive costs, the best services, and the fastest processing by deepening the “one-stop service for one matter” integrated service,. The average number of trips made by enterprises and the citizens to handle matters has decreased from 9.35 to 0.76, and the processing time has been reduced from 28.8 days to 6.7 days accordingly.
The Yangtze River Delta region is one of the most dynamic and developed areas for the private economy in China. Shen Jianrong, the Party Secretary and Director of the Development and Reform Commission of Jiangsu Province, said that the Business Environment Optimization Regulation in Jiangsu Province was issued, 12 local regulations in the fields of promoting SMES (small and medium-sized enterprises) and the business environment for foreign investment have been formulated and revised in Jiangsu Province. Local business environment regulations have been issued in eight cities in Jiangsu province, including Nanjing, Wuxi, and Suzhou, forming a “1+8” local business environment specialized legislation system, continuously promoting comprehensive and specialized legislation on the business environment and constantly optimizing the legal environment.
To address prominent issues such as local protectionism and market segmentation, the establishment of a fair competition review mechanism has been explored in Jiangsu province. “63 cases of various monopolistic clues has been accepted and dealt with and 4 cases have been initiated investigation in 2024 in Jiangsu province. Moreover, a progressive regulatory approach combining credit and law enforcement has been fulfilled. Progressive law enforcement has been carried out 2,668 times in 2024, 1,311 cases of exemption or leniency in penalties have been handled, and fines were reduced by 891.167 million yuan," Shen Jianrong said.
In March 2024, the Business Environment Optimization Regulation in Zhejiang Province (hereinafter to be referred as the Regulation) was issued and put into practice in Zhejiang Province. “The Regulation urges systematic provisions to optimize the business environment from aspects such as market management, government services, factor support, digital empowerment, innovation support, and opening up. It further improves the basic systems of the market economy, including property rights protection, market access, and factors protection for market entities, so as to support a great number of SMEs," Du Xuliang, the Party Secretary and Director of the Development and Reform Commission of Zhejiang Province, told the reporter.
Governments at all levels make great efforts to stimulate investment enthusiasm.
A chief from Shanghai Development and Reform Commission said, “Financial supports for private enterprise have been intensified in Shanghais, a 100 billion yuan industrial investment fund was established focusing on the three leading industries and future industries, and the Several Policies and Measures for Reducing the Burden on Enterprises and Supporting the Development of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises in Shanghai was issued, with estimated annual burden reducing 117 billion yuan."
Projects have been regularly introduced to private capital by Zhejiang government. 389 projects on "three lists" have been sorted out, and 128 of them have successfully attracted 318.9 billion yuan of private investment. In addition, a "State-owned and Private Enterprises Synergistic Development Promotion Conference" has been convened, leading to the signing of 12 major cooperation projects with a total value of 12.8 billion yuan.
To tackle the problems of "difficult financing" for small and micro enterprises and "difficult loaning" for banks, a three-level coordination mechanism (provincial, municipal and county levels) has been tailored to support the financing of small and micro enterprises. Relying on the comprehensive financial service platform, it provides risk compensation, loan interest subsidies and other support for private enterprises. It has also set up a strategic emerging industry mother fund with a total scale of 50 billion yuan, and the first direct investment project has been fulfilled by a private enterprise.
A new mechanism for government and social capital cooperation has been advanced in Anhui province, actively promoting the coordination and implementation of franchise operation projects. It has completed the review of franchise operation plans for 14 expressway and 4 railway projects, leading the country in the progress of franchise operation work. “Relying on the national investment project online platform, a regular promotion mechanism for key projects has been established in Anhui province, attracting private capital of 230.8 billion yuan to 304 projects.” said Chen Jun, Secretary of the Party Group and Director of the Development and Reform Commission of Anhui Province.
“At present, private investment still faces problems such as market entry barriers, high financing costs and difficulty in obtaining financing information, ”stated Zhang Linsan, Director of the Research Office of the Institute of Economic System and Management of the National Development and Reform Commission. “Local government should increase support by formulating favorable policy, broadening financing channels, lowering financing costs, continuously removing market entry barriers, boosting a unified national market, and attracting the potential of private investment."
Governments at all levels make great efforts to establish sharing innovative resources.
It is known that a science and technology resource sharing service platform has been set up in Shanghai, including 28 major scientific research facilities and over 3,000 service institutions, with a total value of instruments exceeding 56 billion yuan.
By building three private enterprise headquarters clusters in South Hongqiao, Zhangjiang and Shibei Hi-Tech Park, and two private economy headquarters parks in Changxing and Jiading New Town, Shanghai is accelerating the improvement of industrial agglomeration levels. Currently, there are 598 private enterprise headquarters and over 10,000 specialized, refined, distinctive and innovative SMEs, and private enterprises accounting for more than 80%.
To promote the aggregation of various innovative resources to enterprises. Technology-based enterprise clusters have bee cultivated and strengthened in Anhui, building a hierarchical cultivation system of “technology-based SMEs”,“high-tech enterprises”, “unicorn enterprises”, “technology listed enterprises”, “ technology leading enterprises", and continuously strengthen the innovation capabilities of the enterprise.
According to Chenjun, four trillion level industries are being built in Anhui province, including automobiles, new generation information technology, equipment manufacturing, and new materials, four industries worth over 500 billion yuan including advanced photovoltaics and new energy storage, green food, modern chemicals, and non-ferrous metals, three industries worth over 300 billion yuan including new building materials, and three industries worth over 100 billion yuan including energy conservation and environmental protection. Efforts have been vigorously made to attract private enterprises to work for the industrial chain.
To promote the aggregation of innovation resources, private enterprises are encouraged to construct major scientific and technological infrastructure and high-level innovation platforms in Jiangsu Province. Shen Jianrong introduced that a total of 183 national level enterprise Research & Development (R&D) institutions and over 9000 provincial-level enterprise R&D institutions have been established in Jiangsu province, of which 50% of national level R&D institutions and 70% of provincial-level R&D institutions have been built by private enterprises. In addition, efforts have been made to accelerate the construction of manufacturing innovation centers in Jiangsu province, striving to create 140 national level enterprise technology centers and 4368 provincial-level ones, and private enterprises accounting for nearly 90%.
Xiao Weiming, Deputy General Secretary of the National Development and Reform Commission, stated that the government would cooperate with relevant parties to carry out special actions in the next step to regulate law enforcement related to enterprises, and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of private enterprises and private entrepreneurs; Infrastructure competitive fields are to be opened fairly to business entities, especially to private enterprises; The policy and system of financing support for private enterprises are to be improved to solve the account arrears; A regular communication and exchange mechanism between the national, provincial, municipal, and county levels and private enterprises is to be established, and the comprehensive service platform for the development of the private economy is to be made good use of, opinions and suggestions of various enterprises would be widely heard to promote the resolution of urgent and common problems of enterprises, so as to push the development of the private economy.