It has always been the core research topic of the national government to build fair competition and unify the market for new energy vehicles. At the beginning of the year, due to the "new energy car fraud", the society was heated up, diluting the concern for local protection.

In 2015, under the vigorous promotion of the government and the active efforts of the industry, China's new energy vehicles have rapidly expanded their market and achieved the best results in the world. Local governments have also contributed. However, with the expansion of the scale of promotion of new energy vehicles, the need to establish a national unified large market has formed a huge contrast with the status quo of the local government and the establishment of a unified market. In 2016, this phenomenon is even more serious.

At present, the sales of new energy vehicles in China are too scattered, and the number of new energy manufacturing enterprises is large and the levels are uneven. Specifically, last year, China's new energy vehicles sold more than 300,000 sales, more than 200,000 passenger cars, at least 19 companies participated in the competition; more than 120,000 sales in the commercial vehicle sector, only 10 passenger car companies.

This means that the total number of new energy vehicles of more than 300,000 vehicles last year was divided by at least 40 companies. According to this development trend, it is difficult to compete with international electric vehicle giants such as Nissan, Tesla, Volkswagen and BMW in the future.

On June 5th, China Electric Vehicles 100 People's Association organized a series of seminars on electric vehicle hotspot issues with the theme of “fair competition and unified market”, seeking ways to crack local protection issues.

“After the subsidy is cancelled in the future, can we still form a competitive advantage enterprise? If each company’s sales volume is 5,000 units and 10,000 units, how can it be internationally competitive?” The experts raised this question.

In the next 5-10 years, the transition period of China's new energy vehicles from government-led to market-led is also a key incubation period. During this period, the harm of local protection has become more serious, directly affecting whether our country's new energy vehicle development strategy can be achieved.

"In the next five years, the survival of the fittest should be achieved, so that a small number of powerful enterprises stand out and form a critical period for the country's core competitiveness. But nowadays, due to the vast diversity of land subsidies, there is a protection umbrella for the backward enterprises. After the 5-year subsidy period has passed, the market growth on the surface In fact, the dominant enterprises have not been cultivated, and the gap with international giants has increased. China’s core competitiveness in the new energy market cannot be formed.” The above experts said that the harm of local protection is obvious from this perspective.

70% of local markets are difficult to get into the car

From a root point, local taxation is actually a fundamental issue of local protection. The central government's financial subsidies plus local government subsidies are the distinctive features of the new energy vehicle incentives implemented in China. This policy has effectively promoted the rapid development of the new energy vehicle market, and also stimulated the local government's fertilizer and water. It is possible to leave both subsidies local.

According to statistics, local protection directly leads to 70% of local market new energy vehicles being difficult to enter.

Among them, local protection mainly has the following forms: First, it is mandatory to require foreign enterprises to set up factories and establish legal entities locally, and its name is “investment for market”. Although some local governments do not explicitly require foreign companies to set up factories in the local area, they are required to purchase a certain proportion of local parts.

“The central government took 72% of the auto tax, and the remaining quarter was collected by the local government. Local governments are rushing to attract investment, especially for joint ventures that are better than self-owned companies because joint ventures are easier. On the upside, it is easier to provide local government with output value.” Liu Zongxi, an associate researcher at the Institute of Automotive Industry and Technology Strategy at Tsinghua University, said.

Second, the policies introduced by various localities are subsidy standards and technical standards that are suitable for the characteristics of local enterprises. These standards are often inconsistent with national standards, causing great confusion to foreign companies, which leads to enterprises failing to have clear objectives in formulating strategic decisions and technical routes.

“There are 88 new energy vehicle promotion pilot cities across the country, and enterprises have to formulate 88 different promotion policies.” Some business representatives complained that enterprises involved in every city to promote new energy vehicles must study local policies, especially subsidy policies. This puts a lot of pressure on the company.

The third is to introduce unfair local non-subsidy policies. In addition to the use of financial subsidy policies, local governments also have non-subsidy policies, preferential local enterprises, and restrictions on foreign enterprises. If there is a place where the plug-in hybrid vehicle that cannot be produced locally is excluded from the local new energy vehicle list, in some places, the subsidy amount for the plug-in hybrid vehicle is determined by the size of the fuel tank to benefit the local property. Small car.

"Every company seems to be the winner, but it is the victim. The final result is a whole victimization and a vicious circle." The guests stressed.

In the short-term, local protection allows companies to taste the sweetness, but in the long run, it is tantamount to drinking and quenching thirst.

Since China's accession to the WTO, it has emphasized balance and unity, paying attention to fairness, equality, and openness, but new energy vehicles just violate this principle. The market should have played a role in the survival of the fittest, but now the backward party can get high subsidies from the local area, and even limit the subsidies of foreign competitors, hindering the healthy development of the market.

In addition, local protection has seriously hindered the development of new energy vehicles and is not conducive to the sustainable development of the industry. Local protectionism undermines market development, leading to an imbalance in market regulation.

The ultimate goal of subsidies is to give enterprises the opportunity and time to reduce costs, so that enterprises can survive completely without subsidies, while local protection makes local enterprises lose the market competition environment and become greenhouse flowers.

Due to various restrictions imposed by the local government on the subsidy mechanism and the technical route, the foreign enterprises have gone a lot of detours and cannot strengthen the technical route. Technology should be chosen by the market, but the current situation is that the company makes products, and the local government puts the corresponding rules on it, which violates the principle of technological diversity and the technological innovation will be limited.

At the same time, local protection affects China's new energy automobile industry to achieve "corner overtaking" in the international arena. Once the subsidies are abolished, foreign new energy vehicles enter the Chinese market, and China's new energy vehicles that have lost government protection may be backward in technology.

From the consumer's point of view, local protectionism undermines the consumer's choice and the space for free choice of new energy vehicles is narrowed.

How is local protection broken?

At present, local protection has become the biggest stumbling block for the promotion of new energy vehicles. It is a major challenge for industrial development and needs to be broken.

Although the local catalogue has been broken at this stage, from the root cause, local protection is still unpredictable. At present, the promotion of new energy vehicles has entered the transition period of the government's role. The government needs to do a top-level design and speed up fiscal and tax reforms to break local protection.

At this stage, the government should strive for the sustainable development of new energy vehicles at the height of the national strategy. Do not arbitrarily change the policies, and have continuity and stability. Moreover, policy development must focus on the mainstream, and should not fall into a specific detail. The details should be decided by the market and consumers.

If the policy is unstable, local policies are always “patched”, which is very unfavorable to the development of the company. For example, Shanghai has recently put forward new requirements for the size of the fuel tank and the technology, which has led many companies to be inadequately prepared. Because the products cannot meet the new requirements, many enterprises no longer produce new products or even reduce production.

“The number of applications for licenses in Beijing in the first four or five months is particularly large, but there are basically no vehicles on board in Shanghai.” A participant said that this is a “patching” policy change affecting the market.

Experts suggest that from the perspective of the root causes of local protection, we should actively accelerate the reform of the fiscal and taxation system. The basic principle is to balance financial and administrative rights. It is not advisable to let local governments manage the problems of the automobile society without providing sufficient funds. The basic principle of adjustment through tax policy is to insist that the tax is taken from the car and used in the car. The tax on the use link should be higher than the production link.

In addition, the process of policy formulation must be open and transparent, adhering to the principles of democracy and openness. It is necessary to adhere to the principle of long-term sustainable market first and open up the use of links.

"For our company, in such a level of fair competition and transparency, we can boldly make strategic decisions, strategic additions and subtractions, and can do three-year planning and five-year planning. We can invest more funds to make technological transformation. In particular, the technological improvements and applications in the new technologies, intelligence, and Internet of Things of the Internet have made our products more technical and competitive in the market." The person in charge of Zhidou Automobile said at the meeting.

Some experts have suggested that local directories and local subsidies should be abolished or limited to a certain amount of state subsidies. At the same time, more guests stressed that the state subsidies need to be replenished, and even directly subsidized to the user side, while increasing the intensity of building infrastructure.

A representative from the charging pile company said: "We hope that the government can establish a mechanism for the market to remove the bad companies that deliberately fight price wars, speculation, and spoiling them, so that those who can really do things and want to do things can go. Longer."

At the meeting, the guests from the company repeatedly stressed that the local and central policies were not matched and did not form a distant response. The local plate is intricate and complicated, which has caused great confusion for enterprises. It is hoped that stable policies can provide enterprises with a longer-term development path map. "In the future, new energy vehicles will no longer be the competition of the products themselves, but the competition of the entire ecological chain. If we want to participate in international competition, we must build the entire ecological chain, rather than staying on the competition of a certain product." A representative of a new energy vehicle manufacturing company said.

Therefore, building a fair competition and a unified market environment is the basis for the sound development of the entire industry, as well as the basic needs. Only by building an environment of fair competition and unified market can China's new energy vehicles achieve leap-forward development.