China to roll out more supportive policies to drive growth of Chinese brands: top economic planner

China will roll out more supportive measures to encourage Chinese brands to achieve innovative growth and green transformation, said the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country's top economic planner, on Friday.

The announcement was made during the ongoing China Brand Day 2024 events in Shanghai.

The five-day events starting Friday, themed "better quality, bright future for Chinese brands," comprise of an opening ceremony, a forum on China's brand development, a China brands exposition and other brand-building activities.

At the opening ceremony, Wu Hao, secretary general of the NDRC, said that the commission will advocate for the deep integration of brand building into key national strategies, including boosting China's strength in manufacturing and product quality, and increase investment in scientific and technological innovation, equipment research and development, and technology upgrading.

"We encourage Chinese brands to continue to contribute to global development, and welcome companies from all over the world to share China's opportunities and create more world-renowned brands. We will accelerate the promotion of large-scale equipment updates and consumer goods trade-in programs, strengthen the capabilities of constructing high-quality infrastructure, and help more brands with faster innovative development and green transformation," said Wu.

Industry insiders say China-chic brands have become a new engine in the consumer market. New domestic brands now account for a remarkable 72 percent share of the online retail market and 58 percent of these brands have been established within the past five years.

"The new round of scientific and technological revolution, with artificial intelligence at its core, coincides with the rise of China-Chic trend. This intersection offers strong technological support for products with China-Chic elements in terms of their research and development and design, and consumers' needs. It will also unleash the potential of such kind of products," said Wang Yiming, vice president of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges.

Experts say those born in the 1990s and 2000s are growing to be the main forces of consumption, contributing to the popularity of the China-Chic products.

"What they pursue is fashion trend, which has brought huge opportunities for China-Chic products to adapt to this new consumer culture and this new wave of consumption," said Wang.

Established in 2017, China Brand Day is celebrated on May 10 every year, and aims to increase society's awareness of brand development and create a sound atmosphere for brand building. ■

China to roll out more supportive policies to drive growth of Chinese brands: top economic planner

The Chinese and Mongolian armies on Sunday held a full-process and all-element live-fire drill at a training field in Dornogovi, a province in southeastern Mongolia, to test and improve the participating troops' ability to jointly combat illegal armed groups.

The drill is part of the China-Mongolia "Steppe Partner-2024" joint army training which opened on May 12.

After the mock battle in the drill began, the participating reconnaissance troops quickly set out to extract the real-time information about the enemy, transmitting it back to the command post.

Meanwhile, the participating air defense unit soon occupied the position for launching attacks, using shoulder-fired missiles to hit targets of the enemy.

The left and right wing assault teams charged forward under the cover of artillery fire and launched fierce attacks on the enemy's targets in the front line.

More than 100 sets of armored equipment from China and Mongolia successfully broke through the foremost defense line with intensive firepower.

Then the Chinese soldiers quickly dismounted from the infantry fighting vehicles under the cover of smoke grenades and annihilated the enemy.

After multiple rounds of strikes, the participating Chinese and Mongolian forces were scattered and deployed to encircle the enemy. Various weapons were employed to fire at the target area, and the remnants of the enemy were completely annihilated finally.

"This is the first joint training organized by the armies of China and Mongolia, focusing on exchanges and mutual learning, live-fire exercise, and aiming to maintain regional peace and stability. In this joint training, we two sides worked together in planning, commanding and operating, which improved our ability to jointly combat illegal armed groups and further deepened strategic mutual trust and practical cooperation between the Chinese and Mongolian armies," said Colonel Ju Qiqi, commander of the participating Chinese troops.

At a closing ceremony for the joint drill held later in the day, distinguished guests from China and Mongolia awarded honorary certificates to officers and soldiers that stood out in the war game.

Next, the Chinese troops will withdraw from the site in an orderly manner as scheduled.

Chinese, Mongolian armies hold live-fire drill to improve collaboration capacities