(Gong Jiong) "Global Epidemic Consultation Room": Chinese and Italian experts discuss how to restart the economy during the epidemic
(Source: CCTV News Client 2020-06-06)
The COVID-19 epidemic sweeping the world not only poses a threat to people's lives, health and safety, but also poses severe challenges to the economic development of various countries. As the epidemic situation in some countries gradually improves, how to promote the resumption of work and production in an orderly manner and ease the pressure of economic recession while continuing to carry out prevention and control is an urgent and critical issue.
On June 5, the "Global Epidemic Consultation Room" of China Central Radio and Television Station (CGTN) held a special program, inviting medical experts, economists and industry leaders from China and Italy to conduct online exchanges on a series of related issues on how to restart the economy. This program is also broadcast simultaneously on Italian Class CNBC TV station and its Internet platform.
With the domestic epidemic in Italy under control, Italy has lifted domestic and overseas travel restrictions from June 3 and is cautiously trying to restart the economy. Since the end of April, China has continued to strictly prevent the spread of the epidemic while steadily promoting the resumption of work and production. The resumption rate of industrial enterprises nationwide has reached more than 98%, and the resumption rate of enterprises above designated size in various retail formats has exceeded 95%.
△Experts from China and Italy communicated on how to restart the economy
Luca Ferrari, Italian Ambassador to China, also participated in the exchange. He said that both China and Italy are currently facing economic growth pressure after the epidemic, and what he sees in China is the gradual recovery of the economy: "As one of my good friends, Thomas Friedman, said in a recent webinar, after the epidemic, it is not necessarily the strongest country that will win, but the country that adapts best. I have seen the strong adaptability of the Chinese economy."
Fang Lanyi believes that at the just-concluded "Two Sessions", the Chinese government introduced very strong measures, especially in promoting the flow of funds within the economic system. Relevant monetary liquidity policies not only benefit Chinese companies, but also foreign companies, including Italian companies. According to predictions from international financial institutions, China's economy will resume growth before the end of the year. This will make China and even the entire Asian market the first region to get rid of the impact of the epidemic and return to normal in the second half of this year. It will also become the most noteworthy market. For Italy and other export-driven European countries, there will be many opportunities.
Fang Lanyi also said that the hardest hit in this epidemic is globalization, and in the past 30 years, many countries have benefited from globalization. To get rid of the impact of the epidemic, countries should return to the path of globalization. This will be an important condition for the economic recovery of China and Europe, and the economic cooperation between China and Italy will become closer.
△Luca Ferrari, Italian Ambassador to China, spoke on the show
Has the toxicity of the new coronavirus weakened?
Due to the recent significant decrease in the number of new infections in Italy, some doctors believe that the virus has become less virulent and the risk of restarting the economy has decreased. Is this true?
Zhu Huachen, associate professor at the w88 casino of Public Health of the University of Hong Kong, is an expert in long-term research on viral emerging infectious diseases. She saw scientists in Italy reporting that the virus was weakening. Zhu Huachen believes that this trend is possible because the new coronavirus is an RNA virus and is more prone to mutation. It is possible that the virus has weakened its pathogenicity in order to better adapt to the human body. However, this speculation requires more clinical data and related research to prove whether this is due to the weakening of the virus's pathogenicity, or whether it is due to the accumulation of experience, more symptomatic treatments and more adequate medical resources.
Carlo Federico Perno, professor of microbiology at the University of Milan, believes that Darwin’s principle of “survival of the fittest” also applies to viruses. The virus is also learning to adapt to the human body and become less likely to kill patients, otherwise the virus will have no host. But Perno points out that usually such adaptations take a long time, ranging from a few years to a few hundred years. It’s unlikely in a matter of weeks or months, so he doesn’t think the virus has changed much from what it was a few months ago.
Perno believes that a balance must be struck between restoring the economy and protecting people's health, because economic needs are also the basic needs of the people. So now Italy has to restart its economy. At the same time, he recommended that people continue to maintain social distance, wear masks and other prevention and control measures. He added that although the number of infections in Italy is now small, the essential characteristics of the virus determine that it can only survive if it continues to infect humans, so the virus may return to the population as Italy opens its ports.
△CGTN anchor Zou Yun and Class CNBC anchor Andrea Cabrini co-hosted this China-Italy expert exchange program
What effective measures has the Chinese government taken to restore economic growth? What can Italy learn from?
Class CNBC anchor Andrea Cabrini asked on the show, what effective measures has the Chinese government taken to restore economic growth? What lessons can Italy learn from?
Gong Jiong, professor of the Department of Economics at the w88 casino, replied that the Chinese government has adopted a series of fiscal and monetary policies to support enterprises, especially small and micro enterprises, because China's small and medium-sized enterprises contribute the most to economic development and have been hardest hit by the epidemic. On the one hand, the government asks banks to provide them with sufficient credit; on the other hand, it takes measures to help them reduce costs, such as helping them reduce rent for one to two months and reduce taxes and fees. For many small and medium-sized enterprises in the export industry, the government also helps them switch their products to the domestic market first, allowing them to survive first and wait for the recovery of the international market.
In addition, the Chinese government also strongly encourages the development of "new infrastructure", which mainly includes seven major areas: 5G base station construction, ultra-high voltage, intercity high-speed railways and urban rail transit, new energy vehicle charging piles, big data centers, artificial intelligence, and industrial Internet, to cultivate new momentum for economic development.
He also introduced that although China's economy slowed down by 6.8% in the first quarter due to the impact of the epidemic, it gradually began to recover in late March and improved significantly in April.
Italian economist Michele Geraci believes that one of the advantages of China's economic restart is that the government has strong appeal and the measures introduced can be implemented through multiple channels. The difference between China and Europe is that the digital development of China's economy is booming, the mobile Internet is very developed, and Chinese consumers are online 24 hours a day. This means that although globalization will weaken in certain industries, digitalization will become increasingly prosperous, and related industries such as artificial intelligence will basically not be affected by the epidemic.
△CGTN host Zou Yun in the "Global Epidemic Consultation Room" Beijing studio
What impact will the epidemic have on the “One Belt, One Road” initiative?
Although the epidemic has dealt a blow to the trend of globalization, experts believe that the "Belt and Road" initiative promoted by China still has strong vitality.
Italy was the first G7 country to join the “One Belt, One Road” initiative, and Professor Michel Grassi played a big role in it. He believes joining the initiative is one of the best things they can do to help businesses, and feedback from most businesses has been positive. He said he actively pushed for Italy to join the initiative because he believed in and endorsed it. He saw that infrastructure construction and urbanization have been the driving force for China's development in the past 20 years. This model is also developing in Asia and Africa. On top of infrastructure, manufacturing can be developed to promote local economic development. He believes that the Belt and Road Initiative should be further promoted now, especially in third world countries, because as Chinese companies continue to move upstream in the global value chain, many countries need to take over some manufacturing industries from China. Italian companies are very strong in energy and infrastructure construction and will also benefit from the "Belt and Road" construction.
Professor Gong Jiong said that due to the impact of the epidemic, the “Belt and Road” project is indeed facing some difficulties, because many developing countries are facing slowdown or even negative economic growth. There are currently more than 2,000 "One Belt, One Road" project loans. Recently, politicians in some countries have proposed that China should waive or exempt loans. However, these projects are not charity projects, but commercial projects, which are also creating more jobs in these countries. He said that looking forward, the overall strategic direction of the Belt and Road Initiative is still good and will strengthen connections between relevant countries and promote infrastructure, w88 and people-to-people exchanges. From China's perspective, in the future, more attention should be paid to countries and industries with low default risks and higher returns.
In the nearly two-and-a-half-hour exchange, experts from the two countries also discussed investment strategies after the epidemic, possible changes in business models, the impact and recovery measures of the epidemic on specific industries such as catering, tourism, retail, automotive, 5G, and changes in global supply chains.
As of June 5, CGTN has conducted a total of 63 live broadcasts of global epidemic consultation rooms, published 1,027 related reports, received 245 million global reads, 1.26 million total interactions, and 74.02 million video views.
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