The China Federation of Logistics & Purchasing recently released logistics operation data for the first half of this year. In the first half of the year, despite the influence of larger-than-expected factors such as the complex and severe international environment and the domestic epidemic impact, China's logistics demand scale was still considerable, and the strong material foundation accumulated over a long period of time and the advantage of super market size were obvious. In the first half of the year, the growth rate of the total social logistics exceeded that of the GDP in the same period.

In the first half of this year, China's total social logistics was about 160 trillion Yuan

In the first half of the year, the total amount of social logistics nationwide reached nearly 160 trillion Yuan (159.7 trillion Yuan), up 3.1 percent year-on-year. In terms of quarterly trend, logistics demand in the second quarter was affected by the epidemic, and the growth rate was 5.3 percentage points lower than that in the first quarter. According to the monthly trend, the logistics demand dropped significantly in April, and the growth rate of the total logistics volume stabilized and rebounded in May and June. The growth rate in June was 3.6%, the highest level in the second quarter.

Shi Xianliang, Dean of School of Economics and Management, Beijing Jiaotong University: Logistics demand showed an obvious rebound in May and June, especially June, which has reached a peak in the second quarter. So on the whole, the national policy of stabilizing growth has played a very significant role in the total demand.

From the perspective of structure, industrial goods logistics demand recovered steadily. In the first half of this year, the total volume of industrial goods logistics increased by 3.4% year-on-year. New growth drivers and new forms of business have maintained rapid growth. In the second quarter, logistics demand for lithium-ion batteries, electronic components, integrated circuits and other sectors grew by more than 20%, and the growth of new drivers continued to play a leading role.

Policies to promote consumption continued to take effect, and logistics demand for people's livelihood grew rapidly. In the first half of this year, the online retail sales of physical goods in China increased by 5.6% year-on-year, accounting for 25.9% of the total retail sales of consumer goods, 1 percentage point higher than that of January to May.

Cai Jin, Vice President of China Federation of Logistics & Purchasing: It should be said that although the operation of China's logistics was greatly affected by the epidemic in the first half of this year, on the whole, the development of China's logistics is relatively resilient. In the first half of this year, the growth of logistics reached more than 3%, which exceeded the growth of GDP in the first half of this year. Therefore, its supporting effect on the economy is relatively obvious.

In addition, from the perspective of import logistics demand, the total amount of import logistics in the first half of the year decreased by 7.3%, which was greater than the decline from January to May. From the perspective of the import flow structure of goods, the performance of various bulk commodities has been differentiated. Among them, iron ore, copper imports have improved, crude oil, coal and other imports of material flow decline has expanded. There was no significant improvement in the flow of imports of industrial manufactured goods.

The effect of the policy of ensuring the availability of logistics has appeared

In the first half of this year, the effect of the policy of ensuring the smooth flow of logistics became apparent, the recovery of logistics supply accelerated, and the market size of the logistics industry realized a good recovery trend.

In the first half of the year, the total revenue of the logistics industry reached 6.0 trillion Yuan, an increase of 6.1% year-on-year, and the growth rate was 0.3 percentage points higher than that of January to May. Among them, transportation logistics revenue has become the main supporting force. Transportation logistics such as railway, waterway and multimodal transportation showed a good growth trend, contributing more than 70% to the total revenue growth of the logistics industry.

Shi Xianliang, Dean of School of Economics and Management, Beijing Jiaotong University: The state has introduced the policy of guaranteeing availability of logistics, which has had a great impact on the transportation industry. In fact, the growth of our railway transportation is still quite good. In particular, the railway transportation represented by the China-Europe service has a good momentum of development.

In the first half of the year, the price of logistics services fluctuated and rebounded. The shipping market is affected by the epidemic, and international shipping prices continue to run at high levels. In particular, since June, the Yangtze River Delta has fully resumed work and production, the port container throughput has recovered well, and the prices of major shipping routes have continued to operate at high levels. The average of China's export container freight index in the first half of the year was 3,288.77 points, up 59.1% year-on-year. Coastal bulk prices have fallen due to high inventories of coal and other commodities and slowing imports. In the highway market, the epidemic prevention and control situation continued to improve in June, and the logistics guarantee was continuously implemented. Road supply and demand improved synchronously, and freight rates rose steadily, generally higher than the level of the same period last year.

Experts said that in a comprehensive view, with the recovery of demand, the price of logistics services gradually slowed down and stabilized.

Cai Jin, Vice President of China Federation of Logistics & Purchasing: For logistics enterprises, with the price stabilizing, the demand for logistics will continue to grow, and the scale of business revenue will further expand. In this way it will create a good scale effect.

In the first half of the year, logistics costs continued to run at a high level

In the first half of the year, logistics costs continued to run high due to the impact of raw materials, labor and other costs. The ratio of total social logistics expenses to GDP, an indicator of economic efficiency, increased slightly in the first half from the first quarter and the same period last year. Experts suggest that it is necessary to further expand the innovative application of new technologies and new models to improve the overall competitiveness of logistics enterprises.

In the first half of this year, the total cost of social logistics increased by 6.1% year-on-year, higher than the growth rate of total social logistics and GDP in the same period. The ratio of total social logistics expenses to GDP was 14.8%, 0.1 percentage points higher than that in the first quarter of this year, indicating that the supply chain has not recovered to a normal level during the economic recovery period, and logistics costs continue to operate at a high level.

In addition, while the operating costs of logistics enterprises continue to rise, corporate profits have fallen. In the first half of the year, the operating cost of logistics enterprises increased significantly. From January to June, the cost of 100 Yuan revenue of key enterprises continued to rise, with a year-on-year growth of 1.6%. In particular, the cost of raw materials and fuel increased rapidly, and the cost of water, aviation and road transportation rose higher than the average level of key enterprises.

Shi Xianliang, Dean of School of Economics and Management, Beijing Jiaotong University: Generally speaking, logistics enterprises are faced with high costs, so its profitability needs to be improved. Therefore, I think we should further advocate the application of new technologies and the innovation of new models at the national level, so that enterprises can better reduce costs and increase profits, so as to improve the overall competitiveness of our logistics enterprises.

From the perspective of the future trend, as the effective coordination between epidemic prevention and control and economic and social development, and the effects of various policies and measures to effectively stabilize the economy continue to emerge, the national economy will continue to maintain a reasonable range, and the logistics demand is expected to pick up at the same time. However, with the increase of extreme seasonal factors such as high temperature and rainy season, logistics business activities will also usher in the traditional off-season.

Cai Jin, Vice President of China Federation of Logistics & Purchasing: In the second half of the year, the situation of the whole logistics operation will further improve, and the resilience of China's logistics will further show. However, we should also see that in terms of the demand for logistics, we should also seek new impetus to promote the further growth of logistics demand.

Source: CCTV News Network