The Sunday Mail
Manyika Kangai
Chinese deep-sea fishing vessel capsizes
Chinese President Xi Jinping has demanded an all-out effort in the rescue of missing people after one of its deep-sea fishing vessels capsized in the Indian Ocean on Tuesday.
President Xi has directed relevant departments to activate the emergency response mechanism immediately.
About 39 mariners who were on board are missing. They include 17 Chinese nationals, 17 Indonesians and five Philippines.
President Xi also ordered the strengthening of early warning systems to ensure people’s and property safety in deep-sea operations.
China establishes new financial regulator
The Chinese government set up the National Administration of Financial Regulation (NAFR) as the country’s new financial regulator on Thursday.
This is part of a plan for institutional reform on financial supervision that was adopted in March.
NAFR, which is under the direct control of the State Council (China’s cabinet), was formed based on the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission.
The new administration oversees the regulation of the financial industry, except for the securities sector.
It will take over certain functions of the People’s Bank of China and the China Securities Regulatory Commission.
The establishment of the new regulator is expected to strengthen and improve China’s financial regulation and tackle some of the long-standing and prominent problems in the financial sector.
China’s retail sales up
China’s retail sales of consumer goods, a major indicator of the country’s consumption strength, continued to see accelerated growth in April.
Data from the country’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) show that retail sales of consumer goods surged 18,4 percent year-on-year in April, about 7,8 percentage points higher than that of March.
Between January and April, China’s retail sales of consumer goods increased 8,5 percent year-on-year to top 14,98 trillion yuan (about US$2,16 trillion).
The catering sector saw its revenue climb by 43,8 percent, while the retail sales of cosmetics goods, gold, silver and jewellery, as well as sports and entertainment goods, all increased over 20 percent in April from the same period last year.
In the first four months, online sales of physical goods gained 10,4 percent year-on-year, while retail sales at department stores went up 11,1 percent from the same period in 2022.
China to promote NEVs in rural areas
China has released a guideline to support people living in rural areas to purchase and use New Energy Vehicles (NEVs), with a focus on boosting the construction of charging infrastructure.
The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the National Energy Administration jointly released the guideline.
According to the guideline, China will accelerate its pace to ensure the full coverage of charging stations at the county level and the full coverage of charging points at the township level.
China will also encourage the use of NEVs in public transport, logistics, delivery and other sectors.
The country will offer consumption coupons to rural residents who intend to purchase NEVs in the county areas of their registered permanent residence.
With a total number of 5,21 million charging points, China’s charging infrastructure network has the largest number of charging facilities, the widest coverage in the world, and the capability to serve all types of NEVs.
China’s Hunan province sees trade with Africa hit record high
China’s Hunan Province saw its foreign trade with African countries in the first quarter soar by 90,4 percent year-on-year to hit a record high of over 22 billion yuan (about US$3,14 billion).
The growth was 40,6 percentage points higher than that of the province’s overall foreign trade.
Growth was mainly sustained by exports, with volumes reaching 17,4 billion yuan (about US$2,48 billion), up 148,7 percent year-on-year.
Notably, agricultural products imported from African countries by Hunan during the period increased by 16,6 times to 150 million yuan (about US$21,41 million).
Natural and synthetic rubber and food also posted a robust increase in terms of imports.
From January to April, the province’s top three trading partners were South Africa, Nigeria and Egypt.
Hunan’s trade with South Africa alone accounted for more than one-fifth of its total foreign trade with African countries during the period.
