A senior Chinese official said in Beijing today that China has basically attained its three-year goal of reforming state-owned enterprises (SOEs), with 4,391 of the 6,599 major large and medium-sized SOEs operating in red becoming profit-making, or being merged or going bankruptcy.
Sheng Huaren, minister of State Economic and Trade Commission, made the remarks while addressing a press conference sponsored by the State Council Information Office.
From January to November 2000, according to Sheng, the state-owned and the state holding industries registered a profit of 208.3 billion yuan, up by 1.4 times over the same period in 1999.
Of the 14 sectors under close monitoring, 12 including light industry, textile, machinery, metallurgy, petrochemical industry, building materials, tobacco, nonferrous metal, electronics, gold, medicine, electric power increased their profits or made up their deficits on a whole. The coal and military industries reduced their net deficits remarkably.
The minister made special reference to the textile industry which, as the breakthrough point for the realization of the three-year goal, achieved its objectives of cutting down the number of spindles and employees and reducing losses in advance, exploring a new way out for the other sectors.
In 1997, 12 provinces (autonomous regions or municipalities directly under the central government) suffered losses on a whole. But by the end of 2000, all 31 provinces made up their deficits generally or increased their profits. The traditional industrial base in northeast China began to make profits ahead of schedule, said Sheng.
Moreover, he said, a modern enterprise system has been established in most of the key large and medium-sized SOEs, and the performance of small SOEs have also improved markedly with such reform measures as reorganization, merger, leasing and contracted management.
Statistics show that small SOEs as a whole made a profit of 2.573 million yuan in the first 11 months of last year.
When asked whether the profit reports from SOEs reliable, he said, “I can’t assure you that all the statistics are true, but I believe they are generally reliable.”
China set in 1997 a target to lift the majority of large and medium-sized SOEs out of difficulties in three years.
Sheng attributed the achievements to a number of policies and measures including restructuring, technological innovation, and the debt-for-equity swap program designed to free key SOEs from debt burdens.
(CIIC by Chen Qiuping 01/09/2001)
