Shanghai launched the fourth edition of the Double Five shopping festival on Saturday, in efforts to invigorate consumer spending and establish the city as a global hub for retail.
Jointly initiated by the Ministry of Commerce, China Media Group (CMG), and the Shanghai government, the festival runs concurrently with the 2024 International Consumption Season and will continue till the end of June.
The opening ceremony was launched by Chen Jining, secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, Wang Wentao, Minister of Commerce, and Shen Haixiong, President of CMG.
The event also includes the Third International Consumption Center City Forum, where Wang Wentao and Shen Haixiong gave keynote speeches.
This year's shopping festival highlights the integration of commerce with travel, cultural exhibitions, and sports, focusing on emerging trends such as the first-store economy, brand economy, nighttime economy, and live-streaming economy.
The first-store economy initiative promotes flagship stores, transforming key cities into global consumption hubs and enhancing shopping experiences, while brand economics analyzes the impact of brand dynamics on financial outcomes, crucial in today's intangible economy.
Featuring over 1,000 distinct events, the festival targets a wide range of sectors including new types of consumption, services, automotive, and green products.
The 2024 International Consumption Season, designed as a flagship promotional event by the Ministry of Commerce, is aimed at integrating global consumer goods and fostering a synergy among commerce, travel, culture, sports, and health sectors, running from May to December.
These themed activities for promoting consumption will feature a series of monthly events and weekly themes across the country to fully meet the diverse consumption needs of the public.
Shanghai launches shopping festival to unleash consumption, boost economy
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks with Cho Tae-yul, foreign minister of the Republic of Korea (ROK), in Beijing on Monday.
Wang, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, said that China and the ROK are close neighbors and should maintain regular exchanges.
Recently, China-ROK relations have been facing difficulties and challenges, which is not in the common interests of both sides, nor is it what China wants to see, Wang said, adding that it is hoped that the ROK side will work with China to stick to the original intention of establishing diplomatic ties, adhere to the direction of good neighborliness and friendship, stick to the goal of mutually beneficial cooperation, remove disturbances, and make joint efforts to push for the sound and steady development of China-ROK relations. He pointed out that China and the ROK should understand and respect each other, strengthen communication and exchanges, eliminate misunderstandings and enhance mutual trust.
Wang added that China hopes the ROK side abides by the one-China principle, properly and prudently handles Taiwan-related issues, and consolidates the political foundation of bilateral relations. The two sides should send more objective and positive messages, increase positive guidance, and strengthen people-to-people exchanges to consolidate public support for bilateral relations.
China is speeding up the development of new quality productive forces, promoting high-quality development and expanding high-level opening up, which will bring important opportunities to the ROK, Wang said, adding that the two sides should deepen mutually beneficial cooperation, be reliable and long-term partners in each other's development process, jointly oppose trade protectionism, safeguard the international free trade system, and ensure stable and unimpeded production and supply chains.
Cho said that it is hoped that this visit will become an important step forward in ROK-China relations. The ROK government attaches great importance to its relations with China, and looks forward to working closely with China to develop a healthier and more mature strategic cooperative partnership on the basis of mutual respect, reciprocity and common interests.
He added that it is in the common interests of the two countries and peoples and the expectation of the international community to promote the development of ROK-China relations and jointly meet common challenges. The ROK is willing to enhance mutual trust, expand consensus and focus on cooperation with China, thus avoiding geopolitical constraints as much as possible and jointly opening up a new situation of bilateral cooperation.
The two sides also exchanged views on China-Japan-ROK cooperation, the situation on the Korean Peninsula and other issues of common concern.
At the invitation of Wang, Cho is visiting China from May 13 to 14.
Chinese foreign minister holds talks with ROK counterpart
