CHINA: 121st Session Of The Canton Fair

The concluding press conference of the 121st session of theCanton Fair was held in the Canton Fair Complex on May 5. Xu Bing, Spokesperson of the Canton Fair and Deputy Director General of China ForeignTrade Centre introduced the general situation of this session.

Xu pointed out that the 121st session is a critical sessionimplementing the outlines of President Xi’s congratulatory letter and PremierLi’s instructions, thus it is of great significance of continuing the past andbreaking new ground for the future.

With theattention and care of the central government, the State Council, with the support and the leadership of the Ministry of Commerce, Guangdong Province and Guangzhou municipal government, we stood firm in implementing the newdevelopment concepts, deepening reform and innovation and giving full play to Canton Fair’s platform of opening China up.

We’ve strived for specialization,information technology application, market orientation and internationalapproach of the Canton Fair, promoted upgrading and optimization of the foreigntrade mix and boosted the development of China’s open economy.

With theconcerted efforts of our staff, the 121st Canton Fair went onsmoothly and we reached our goals.

Xu said that the number and quality of overseas buyers both increasedthis session. Buyer attendance totaled 196,490 from 213 countries (regions), upby 5.87% over the 119th session.

In terms of buyer attendance of all continentsin descending order, the number of buyers from Asia totaled 112,314, taking up 57.16%of the total; Europe 32,664, accounting for 16.62%; Americas 29,998, accounting for 15.27%; Africa 15,085 with 7.68% share, and Oceania 6,429 with 3.27% share.

Compared with the 119th session, buyer attendance from Asia increased by 5.5%, from Europe increased by 4.97%,Americas up by 9.6%, Africa up by 3.72%, and Oceania up by 5.36%.

The number ofbuyers from countries in the “Belt and Road Initiative” stood at 88,574, up by8.55%.

Buyer attendanceof the top 20 countries and regions accounted for 61.59% of the total, roughlythe same share compared with the 119th session. The top 10 countriesand regions in terms of buyer attendance are Hong Kong, the United States,India, Taiwan Province, Thailand, South Korea, Russia, Malaysia, Australia, andJapan.

Buyer attendancefrom China’s top 10 trading partner countries and regions accounted for 58.49%of the total, roughly the same level compared with the 119th level.

Altogether 1,119 international chain companies attended the Fair. 109 out of the Top 250 GlobalRetailers in 2017 attended the Fair, 17 more than the 119th session.Among them there were 6 of the Top 10 retailers: Wal-Mart, Walgreen, Carrefour,Aldi, Tesco, and Amazon.

Regular buyerswith more than 10 times’ attendance totaled 48,914, up by 1.61%; buyers withmore than 15 times’ attendance 35,502, up by 4.45%.

Buyer attendance proportion in terms of their business line is: (top five) electronics andhousehold electrical appliances accounting for 40.02% of the total, dailyconsumer goods 31.86%, home decorations 28.95%, gifts 28.1%,and textile and garment 25.49%.

Xu mentionedthat this session witnesses stabilizing growth of the export transaction. The accumulatedexport transaction of this session totaled 206.357 billion RMB Yuan (or 30.02billion US dollars), an increase of 6.9 % over the 119th session.

The transaction volume in brand zone reached 10.9 billion US dollars, an increaseof 16.9% over the 119th session, accounting for 36.3% of the total;the transaction with the “Belt and Road” countries totaled 9.01 billion dollars, a year-on-year increase of 4.8%. Of all orders, 45% are short-termorders within 3 months, 35.9% are mid-term orders covering 3-6 months and 19.1%are long-term orders over 6 months.

Xu said that inthis session, structural reform on the supply side of foreign trade wasadvanced. Exhibitors stepped up their product design and research investment,developed new source of growth in the foreign trade development, moved to the higher end of the value chain and formed new advantage based on technology,brand, quality, and service.

Also they led innovation with strengthened R&D, and presented more products that have high technological content, high added value, and products that are smart, green and low-carbon, showing to theworld the technological and innovative capacity of Chinese companies and China’s smart manufacturing ability.

These products at the Canton Fair were verypopular among buyers. Exhibitors were very active in implementing branding strategy; they established brand design and marketing center, engaged in the registration and protection of their trademarks and patents in other countries and witnessed stabilizing growth of export turnover in products with their own brands.

Moreover, they also referred to advanced international qualitystandards, passed globally-recognized product test and acquired green and safety certification, accelerating their strategy of globalization.

They focused on improving after-sale service as an important means to explore internationalmarket, and expanded their serve range, improved service quality and efficiencyand perfected service support system. By using Internet plus and big data theyenhanced their service capacity and customer satisfaction.

Xu pointed out that in the new era Canton Fair has expanded new functions and made a betteruse of domestic and international markets and resources; it has become acomprehensive service platform with export transaction at its core andmulti-functions such as customer networking, display and negotiation,industrial communication, information release, product introduction and brand promotion.

Firstly, important plat form to increase export. Canton Fair serves as an important platform for exportas the total transaction volume each year stands at 60 billion USD. According to our survey, the transaction volume exhibitors achieved with customers met atthe Canton Fair accounted for 23.7% of their annual export volume on average;79.9% of Canton Fair transactions were made after the Fair and this number ison the rise.

Secondly, enhanced ability in leading design and innovation. Through design display, design match making and Canton Fair Design Awards, Canton Fair has been leading andencouraging exhibitors to enhance their product design and innovation capacity.

In this session 97 design agencies were consulted 20,000 times on design service, 40.53% of which are projects to follow up.

This shows enthusiastic bridging between exhibitors and design agencies and significant results ofdisplay. During global marketing summit and promotion conference for smar tMade-in-China, the demand for sourcing stood strong, indicating an innovativemodel for industrial matchmaking.

Canton Fair Design Awards has served as anengine for exhibitors to spur product innovation and establish their brands as the winning products enjoyed brisk transaction.

Thirdly, enhanced import function. In this session, the International Pavilion introduced industrial products with high technological content and high-end brands and consumer products that met the demand of the Chinese market.

Machinery and electrical industrial leaders from the US and Japan,household appliances brands from the “Belt and Road” countries, and consumer brands from Germany, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, India and Turkey all enjoyed excellent results such as receiving big orders, signing cooperation agreement, reaching cooperation intent, working with Chinese partners on production, and connecting with overseas buyers.

Fourthly, an important channel for meeting customers. During this session, the number of new buyers amounted to 80,397, a year-on-year increase of 7.29%. Our survey shows that exhibitors with the purpose of meeting new customers and buyers hoping to find new suppliers and products accounted for94.6% and 78.7% respectively.

Fifthly,promoted industrial exchange. In this session we held 27 conferences and forums, with the themes covering industrial summit, brand marketing, trend,R&D, company management, etc. These forums were welcomed by exhibitors,helped them explore markets, strengthen brands, boost foreign trade advantage,and provided a platform of opening up for local sectors and economy.

Exhibitors mentioned that forums broadened their horizon and brought insight for the future planning of their companies.

Sixthly,an important venue for new products and brand promotion. Many exhibitors brought new products to the Fair and some witnessed a new product update rate of 80%. Brand booths took up 20% of the total, and transaction volume accounting for 36.3%, indicating Canton Fair’s role in guiding brand development.

We held promotion activities for local sectors of Heilongjiang Province, Liaoning Province and Chengdu City as well as trade matchmaking activities in various forms. 38 display activities for exhibitors and brands were staged, providing image presentation, brand promotion, product demonstration for exhibitors to attract buyers.

Xu Bing also introduced that in this session we relied on Canton Fair official website,exhibitors and products search system, highlight products column, global social media, Best platform, smart security system to make new ways in Canton Fair marketing, smart management and convenient service.

We’ve continued to improve the official website, exhibitors and products search system, highlight products column, and customers’ attention, with visits to all these increased.

Xu mentioned that we’ve also driven green move-in in this session and strengthened elimination mechanism for construction companies of custom-built booths.We’ve standardized management of simplified decoration of standard booths, and stepped up onsite monitoring, inspection and approval for better evaluation of Canton Fair Green Development Plan.

With the concerted efforts of trading delegation,chambers of commerce, exhibitors, construction companies of custom-built booths and China Foreign Trade Centre, we’ve made positive results in making green move-in a permanent mechanism. The 100% green booth coverage rate has been achieved in this session.

The display result of green booths has been further improved; 2941 green custom-built booths applied for the related award.

CantonFair is China’s first exhibition to propose, practice and implement green development, providing a fresh example of green and low-carbon development for the Chinese exhibition industry.

Xu stated that in this session, the Canton Fair Complaint Station handled 476 IPR cases, with 595 exhibitors filed and 315 determined as constituting alleged infringement.

Compared with the previous session, the number of cases handled decreased by 16.05%,the number of filed enterprises decreased by 2.46%, and the number of alleged infringement down by 4.83%. The Station also dealt with 25 trade disputes, 11 less than the last session.

The significant drop in the number of cases, filed companies and IPR infringement companies demonstrated that exhibitors’awareness of IPR protection was enhanced and IPR protection at the Canton Fair has yielded great results.

Also in this session, China Foreign Trade Centre and Guangdong Intellectual Property Office signed “Strategic Partnership on IPR Protection at the Canton Fair” to explore new models of IPR protection and do a better job protecting IPR in a larger scope and higher level.