The General Office of the CPC Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council issued the "Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Healthy Development of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises"

Recently, the General Office of the CPC Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council issued the "Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Healthy Development of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises" and sent a notice requiring all regions and departments to conscientiously implement it according to their actual conditions.

The full text of the "Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Healthy Development of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises" is as follows.

Small and medium-sized enterprises are a vital force in the national economy and social development. They are an important force in expanding employment, improving people's livelihood, and promoting entrepreneurship and innovation. They play an important role in stabilizing growth, promoting reform, adjusting structure, benefiting people's livelihood, and preventing risks. The CPC Central Committee and the State Council attach great importance to the development of small and medium-sized enterprises, issuing a series of policy measures in finance and taxation, business environment, public services, and other areas, achieving positive results. At the same time, with changes in the international and domestic market environment, small and medium-sized enterprises face increasingly prominent problems such as rising production costs, difficulties and high costs in financing, and insufficient innovation and development capabilities, which must be highly valued. To promote the healthy development of small and medium-sized enterprises, the following opinions are proposed.

1. Guiding Ideology

Guided by Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, fully implement the spirit of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China and the second and third plenary sessions of the 19th Central Committee. Adhere to and improve China's basic socialist economic system, uphold the "two unwavering principles," adhere to the general tone of seeking progress while maintaining stability, follow the new development concept, take supply-side structural reform as the main line, focus on improving development quality and efficiency, and build a fair and convenient business environment according to the principle of competitive neutrality, further stimulating the vitality and development momentum of small and medium-sized enterprises. Earnestly implement the Small and Medium-sized Enterprise Promotion Law, alleviate difficulties faced by small and medium-sized enterprises, stabilize and enhance enterprise confidence and expectations, increase support for innovation, improve the professional development capabilities of small and medium-sized enterprises and the integrated development level of large, medium, and small enterprises, and promote the healthy development of small and medium-sized enterprises.

2. Creating a Favorable Development Environment

(1) Further relax market access. Resolutely eliminate all unreasonable thresholds and restrictions, create a fair competition environment in market access, approval and licensing, bidding and tendering, military-civilian integration development, and other aspects, providing ample market space. Continuously reduce the negative list of market access items, promote the universal implementation of "non-prohibited means access," and maximize the facilitation of market entry.

(2) Proactively serve small and medium-sized enterprises. Further deepen the "delegation, regulation, and service" reform for small and medium-sized enterprises. Continue to advance business system reforms, making enterprise registration and deregistration more convenient. Promote environmental impact assessment system reform, implement the environmental impact registration form filing system, and reduce project environmental impact assessment approval time to half of the statutory limit. Properly implement the fair competition review system, create a fair, open, and transparent market environment, and clean up and abolish various regulations and practices that hinder a unified market and fair competition. Proactively serve enterprises and provide "one enterprise, one policy" assistance for difficulties encountered in enterprise development.

(3) Implement a fair and unified market supervision system. Innovate supervision methods and integrate supervision into services. Avoid simple and crude measures against small and medium-sized enterprises in micro-law enforcement in safety supervision, environmental protection, and deleveraging of financial institutions. Deepen anti-monopoly and anti-unfair competition law enforcement to ensure fair market competition for small and medium-sized enterprises. Firmly protect the property rights and other legitimate rights and interests of enterprises and their investors; no unit or individual shall infringe upon the property and lawful income of small and medium-sized enterprises. Strictly prohibit all acts that hinder the development of small and medium-sized enterprises and hold violators accountable.

3. Solving the Problems of Difficult and Expensive Financing

(1) Improve financing policies for small and medium-sized enterprises. Further implement the targeted reserve requirement ratio cut policy for inclusive finance. Increase support for small and micro enterprises through rediscounting, focusing on rediscounting small bills of 5 million yuan and below for small and micro enterprises. Expand the scope of the small loan policy to eligible small and medium-sized banks (including new internet banks). Include small and micro enterprise loans with single credit lines of 10 million yuan and below in the range of eligible collateral for medium-term lending facilities.

(2) Actively broaden financing channels. Further improve the bond issuance mechanism, implement private enterprise bond financing support tools, and support reasonable bond financing needs of private enterprises with normal operations but temporary liquidity tightness through various means such as selling credit risk mitigation certificates and providing credit enhancement services. Explore the implementation of private enterprise equity financing support tools, encourage the establishment of market-oriented special funds for mergers and acquisitions or financial investments of private enterprises. Vigorously develop high-yield bonds, private placement bonds, special debt financing tools for innovation and entrepreneurship, venture capital fund bonds, and special bonds for innovative and entrepreneurial enterprises. Study promoting financing for small and medium-sized enterprises based on accounts receivable, supply chain finance, franchise rights, etc. Improve the risk-sharing and compensation mechanism for intellectual property pledge financing and leverage intellectual property to enhance credit and loans. Guide financial institutions to issue medium- and long-term loans to small and micro enterprises and develop loan renewal products.

(3) Support direct financing through capital markets. Accelerate the initial public offering process for small and medium-sized enterprises, facilitating listing for those with prominent main businesses and standardized operations. Deepen reforms in issuance, trading, and information disclosure, supporting small and medium-sized enterprises to list and finance on the New Third Board. Promote pilot corporate bonds for innovation and entrepreneurship companies and improve the convertible bond conversion mechanism for innovation and entrepreneurship. Study allowing listed companies to issue convertible corporate bonds. Implement the reverse linkage system between the share reduction ratio and investment period of venture capital funds, encouraging and supporting early-stage innovation and entrepreneurship. Encourage specialized funds such as local intellectual property operation funds to serve the innovative development of small and medium-sized enterprises. For enterprises with stock pledge risks, study and formulate related transitional mechanisms based on market-oriented and legal principles, and take risk prevention and resolution measures according to the specific situation of enterprises.

(4) Reduce the financing burden on enterprises. Encourage financial institutions to expand export credit insurance policy financing and export tax rebate account pledge financing to meet the financial service needs of import and export enterprises. Accelerate the role of the national financing guarantee fund, guide guarantee institutions to gradually cancel counter-guarantees, and reduce guarantee fees. Clean up and regulate mandatory guarantees, insurance, appraisal, notarization, and other matters required during small and medium-sized enterprise financing, reduce additional costs in the financing process, and lower financing costs; if related fees cannot be waived, local finances shall formulate incentive and subsidy measures to encourage fee reduction based on actual conditions.

(5) Establish a classified supervision and assessment mechanism. Study relaxing the single-customer limit on risk capital preferential weights for small and micro enterprise loans, further releasing commercial banks' economic capital for small and micro enterprise loans. Revise financial enterprise performance evaluation methods, appropriately relax assessment indicator requirements, and encourage financial institutions to increase credit investment in small and micro enterprises. Guide banking financial institutions to strengthen internal incentive transmission mechanisms for small and micro businesses, optimize credit resource allocation, improve performance assessment plans, appropriately reduce profit assessment indicator weights, and allocate special incentive funds; encourage preferential internal fund transfer pricing for small and micro businesses; refine non-performing tolerance management for small and micro enterprise loans, improve credit due diligence exemption provisions, increase incentives for grassroots institutions to issue loans to private and small and micro enterprises, and raise the credit proportion for private and small and micro enterprises; enhance credit risk control capabilities and implement standardized service fee policies.

4. Improve Fiscal and Tax Support Policies

(1) Improve financial and tax support for financing small and micro enterprises. Implement policies to reduce fees and provide subsidies for financing guarantees for small and micro enterprises. The central government allocates subsidy funds to guide local governments to support the expansion of financing guarantee business scale for small and micro enterprises in the real economy sector and reduce financing guarantee costs. Further lower the policy threshold for interest subsidies on entrepreneurial guarantee loans. The central government allocates funds to support local governments in providing interest subsidies and rewards for entrepreneurial guarantee loans to small and micro enterprises, while promoting related statistical monitoring and analysis work. Implement policies exempting value-added tax on interest income from loans to small and micro enterprises and individual industrial and commercial households with single credit lines of 10 million yuan or less, and pre-tax deduction policies for loan loss reserves.

(2) Reduce tax and fee burdens on small and medium-sized enterprises. Clean up and regulate enterprise-related charges, accelerate the promotion of zero charges for local administrative and institutional fees related to enterprises. Promote substantial tax reductions such as value-added tax, and implement inclusive tax reductions and exemptions for small and micro enterprises and technology-based startups. According to actual conditions, reduce social insurance rates and support small and medium-sized enterprises in absorbing employment.

(3) Improve government procurement policies supporting small and medium-sized enterprises. Governments at all levels should facilitate financing business under government procurement for small and medium-sized enterprises and disclose government procurement contracts and other information in a timely manner according to law. Study and revise interim measures for government procurement to promote the development of small and medium-sized enterprises, adopt budget reservation, eliminate thresholds, and provide preferential evaluations to implement policies promoting the development of small and medium-sized enterprises through government procurement. In government procurement activities, give preference to specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative small and medium-sized enterprises.

(4) Fully leverage the guiding role of various funds. Promote the National SME Development Fund to follow market-oriented, corporatized, and professional manager system construction paths, supporting seed-stage, startup, and growth-stage small and medium-sized enterprises, playing a greater role in promoting SME transformation, upgrading, and achieving high-quality development. Vigorously advance the implementation and operation of national emerging industry development funds and military-civilian integration industry investment funds, supporting financing for high-quality enterprises in strategic emerging industries and military-civilian integration industry fields.

5. Enhance innovation and development capabilities

(1) Improve the innovation and entrepreneurship environment. Strengthen central government financial support for technological innovation in small and medium-sized enterprises. Increase support for technological innovation in SMEs through national science and technology programs, adjust and improve project approval, task deployment, and organizational management methods, significantly increase the proportion of SMEs undertaking R&D tasks. Encourage large enterprises to open and share resources with SMEs, build an innovation network for coordinated development of large, medium, and small enterprises around innovation chains and industrial chains. Promote professional maker spaces to enhance service capabilities and achieve precise support for innovation and entrepreneurship. Improve mechanisms for open sharing of scientific and technological resources, encourage research institutions and universities to build network management platforms, establish efficient docking mechanisms, and promote the opening of large scientific research instruments and experimental facilities to SMEs. Encourage SMEs to participate in co-building national major scientific research infrastructure. The central government allocates funds to support a batch of national and provincial development zones to build characteristic carriers integrating large, medium, and small enterprises, professional capital agglomeration, scientific and technological resource support, and high-end talent leadership.

(2) Effectively protect intellectual property rights. Use the internet, big data, and other means to strengthen intellectual property protection through source tracing, real-time monitoring, and online identification, accelerate the establishment of punitive compensation systems for infringement, increase the cost of violations, and protect the innovation and R&D achievements of SMEs. Organize and implement the SME intellectual property strategy promotion project, carry out patent navigation, assist SMEs in technology R&D layout, and promote intellectual property counseling, early warning, agency, and trusteeship services.

(3) Guide the specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative development of SMEs. Support and promote the transformation and upgrading of SMEs, focus on main businesses, enhance core competitiveness, continuously improve development quality and level, and follow the path of specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative development. Research and formulate evaluation systems for specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative enterprises, and establish dynamic enterprise databases. Based on specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative SMEs, cultivate a batch of "little giant" enterprises with outstanding main businesses, strong competitiveness, and good growth in core basic components (components), key basic materials, advanced basic processes, and industrial technology foundations. Implement special projects for integrated development of large, medium, and small enterprises, create a batch of typical demonstration and new models for integrated development. Cultivate a batch of pilot demonstration projects for manufacturing innovation and entrepreneurship platforms in areas such as factor aggregation, capability openness, model innovation, and regional cooperation, leading manufacturing integrated development to a new level.

(4) Provide informatization services for SMEs. Promote the development of "Internet + SMEs," encourage large enterprises and professional service institutions to build cloud manufacturing platforms and cloud service platforms for SMEs, develop products, solutions, and toolkits suitable for the intelligent manufacturing needs of SMEs, and improve the support service system for intelligent manufacturing of SMEs. Promote cloud deployment of SME business systems, guide SMEs with foundations and conditions to advance intelligent transformation of production lines, and promote the deployment and application of low-cost, modular intelligent manufacturing equipment and systems in SMEs. Vigorously promote the reduction of broadband dedicated line access fees for SMEs in central and western regions.

6. Improve service guarantee work

(1) Improve the public service system. Regulate intermediary agency behavior, improve the quality level of intermediary services such as accounting, legal, asset appraisal, and information, and prioritize providing high-quality and efficient information consulting, entrepreneurship guidance, technical support, investment and financing, intellectual property, accounting and taxation, and legal consulting services for SMEs. Strengthen the construction and cultivation of SME public service demonstration platforms. Build a cross-departmental internet platform for SME policy information release, timely collect various policies and government service information related to SMEs such as laws and regulations, innovation and entrepreneurship, finance and taxation, and rights protection, achieving one-stop service for SME policy information. Establish and improve statistical survey, monitoring, analysis, and regular release systems for SMEs.

(2) Promote credit information sharing. Further improve the directory of small and micro enterprises and actively promote bank-business cooperation. Rely on the national enterprise credit information publicity system and the directory of small and micro enterprises to establish and improve the small and micro enterprise database. Based on the national public credit information sharing platform, build a national comprehensive credit service platform for SME financing, develop "Credit Easy Loan," share registration, administrative licensing, administrative penalties, "blacklist," as well as tax, social security, utilities, warehousing, logistics, and other information with commercial banks, improve information asymmetry between banks and enterprises, and enhance credit scores and loan accessibility for SMEs with good credit status.

(3) Emphasize cultivating the entrepreneur team. Continue to do a good job in training leading talents in SME business management to improve SME management levels. Improve effective protection mechanisms tolerant of failure to create a good environment for entrepreneur growth. Improve talent treatment policy guarantees and classification evaluation systems. Build clean and close government-business relations, promote entrepreneur participation in formulating enterprise-related policies, and fully listen to entrepreneur opinions and suggestions. Establish outstanding entrepreneur models and vigorously promote the entrepreneurial spirit.

(4) Support foreign cooperation and exchanges. Optimize customs procedures, simplify formalities, and reduce enterprise customs clearance costs. Deepen bilateral and multilateral cooperation, strengthen SME exchanges and cooperation in promoting policies, trade and investment, and technological innovation. Support qualified localities in building China-foreign SME cooperation zones. Encourage SME service institutions and associations to explore establishing "SME Centers" in countries and regions with mature conditions. Continue to successfully hold the China International SME Fair and support SMEs to participate in domestic and overseas exhibitions and sales activities.

7. Strengthen organizational leadership and overall coordination

(1) Strengthen support and overall guidance. Party committees and governments at all levels should earnestly implement the decisions and deployments of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on supporting the development of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), actively adopt targeted measures, and proactively help enterprises solve practical difficulties in policies, financing, and business environment. Relevant departments should strengthen research on problems faced by SMEs and promptly introduce solutions according to division of responsibilities, while actively promoting good experiences. Strengthen the organizational structure and working mechanism for promoting SME development, fully play the role of organizational leadership, policy coordination, guidance, and supervision, clarify departmental responsibilities and divisions of labor, enhance supervision and inspection, and promote policy implementation.

(2) Strengthen work supervision and evaluation. The Office of the Leading Group for Promoting SME Development under the State Council should strengthen supervision of the work promoting the healthy development of SMEs, entrust third-party institutions to regularly conduct evaluations of the SME development environment and publicly release the results. Local governments should organize evaluations of the SME development environment based on actual conditions.

(3) Create a favorable public opinion atmosphere. Vigorously publicize policies and laws promoting SME development, emphasize the important position and role of SMEs in the national economy and social development, commend advanced models emerging in SME development and services, so that enterprises gain more sense of achievement and honor, forming a good social public opinion environment conducive to the healthy development of SMEs.

Source: Xinhua Net