Interpretation of the Notice of the Ministry of Finance on Improving the Financial Subsidy Policy for the Promotion and Application of New Energy Vehicles
Recently, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Science and Technology and the National Development and Reform Commission (hereinafter referred to as the "four ministries") jointly issued the Notice on Adjusting and Perfecting the Subsidy Policy for New Energy Vehicles (Cai Jian [2020] No.86, hereinafter referred to as the "Notice"). The relevant contents are now interpreted as follows:
I. Background of the promulgation of the Notice
In accordance with the decision-making arrangements of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, the Ministry of Finance, together with relevant departments, has strongly supported the development of new energy automobile industry since 2009. Thanks to the joint efforts of all parties, the key technologies of new energy vehicles in China have made remarkable progress, and the product performance has been significantly improved. The annual sales volume has increased from less than 500 vehicles in 2009 to 1.206 million vehicles in 2019, ranking first in the world for five consecutive years.
Affected by multiple unfavorable factors, the sales of new energy vehicles in China decreased by 4.0% year-on-year in 2019. Coupled with the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic, the sales of new energy vehicles decreased by 56.4% from January to March. Extending the subsidy support policy is conducive to hedging the impact of the epidemic, promoting automobile market consumption, improving comprehensive competitiveness and promoting high-quality industrial development. On the basis of in-depth follow-up investigation and soliciting opinions from all sides, the four ministries and commissions have formed a subsidy policy plan for new energy vehicles in 2020, and issued the above Notice after approval.
Second, the basic idea of improving the subsidy policy for new energy vehicles
Implement the decision-making arrangements of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, maintain support for the new energy automobile industry, make precise policies, and promote the high-quality development of the industry. First, we should keep the word steady, comprehensively consider technological progress, scale effect and other factors, reasonably extend the subsidy policy that was originally scheduled to expire at the end of 2020 to the end of 2022, and smooth the intensity and pace of subsidy retreat. The second is to help the superior and the strong, appropriately optimize the technical threshold, set the liquidation threshold, guide local rational investment and enterprises to "practice their internal strength", promote superior enterprises to become bigger and stronger, accelerate the withdrawal of backward production capacity, and improve industrial concentration. The third is to highlight key points, implement differentiated subsidies according to application fields, improve policy accuracy, and accelerate the process of electrification of public transportation and vehicles in specific fields. The fourth is to implement responsibilities and strengthen supervision. Improve supporting policies, implement the responsibilities of relevant parties, strengthen fund supervision, and further create a good ecology for industry development.
Iii. Consideration of extending the subsidy period
According to the decision of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, the central government has subsidized the purchase of new energy vehicles since 2009. According to the original plan, by the end of 2020, China’s new energy vehicles can achieve the goal of 5 million vehicles set in the Development Plan for Energy-saving and New Energy Vehicle Industry (2012-2020), and then through the relay of non-subsidy policy, the industry will gradually realize market-oriented development, and the subsidy policy will be withdrawn after achieving the expected goal.
According to the new situation of industrial development, in view of the problems existing in industrial development, in order to promote automobile consumption, the the State Council executive meeting on March 31 decided to extend the subsidy policy for the purchase of new energy vehicles due at the end of 2020 for two years. Main considerations:
The first is to help solve problems and promote high-quality industrial development. The development of new energy vehicles in China started early and made a good start, but there are still some practical difficulties at present, and the cost of new energy vehicles is still high, making it difficult to compete with traditional vehicles. Continued support is needed to consolidate and expand the hard-won development achievements.
The second is to conform to the development trend and enhance the comprehensive competitiveness. From the development trend of international automobile industry, electrification is the direction of transformation and upgrading. Developed countries such as Europe and America are increasing their support. In this case, it is necessary to continue the fiscal and taxation policy support for new energy vehicles, maintain a good development momentum, and enhance industrial competitiveness.
The third is to hedge the impact of the epidemic and promote automobile consumption. The COVID-19 epidemic has had a great impact on the new energy vehicle market. Extending preferential support policies will help stimulate market consumption, hedge the impact of the epidemic, and also help support related industries and enterprises to speed up the resumption of work and production.
Fourth, the consideration of properly optimizing technical indicators
In recent years, the subsidy policy for new energy vehicles adheres to the policy orientation of "supporting the excellent and strengthening the strong", and promotes the obvious progress of new energy vehicle technology through measures such as continuously raising the technical threshold. The driving range of pure electric passenger cars increased from an average of about 160 kilometers in 2015 to an average of about 350 kilometers in 2019, the average power consumption decreased from about 17 kWh/100 kilometers in 2015 to about 14 kWh/100 kilometers in 2019, and the energy density of power battery system increased from about 95 Wh/kg in 2015 to about 150 Wh/kg in 2019.
At present, the technology of new energy vehicle products has entered a stage of steady improvement, and the contradiction between improving the energy density of power battery system and product safety has appeared. To this end, the four ministries and commissions, in accordance with the principles of advanced technology, reliable quality and guaranteed safety, maintain the overall stability of the technical index system, give stable expectations to enterprises, and promote enterprises to further improve the technical level and safety and reliability of products. In 2020, most technical indicators will remain unchanged, and in principle, they will remain stable in 2021 -2022, and will be appropriately adjusted according to technological progress and industrial development. At the same time, support the development of new business models such as "separation of vehicles and electricity" and encourage enterprises to develop and produce new energy automobile products with advanced underlying operating systems, electronic and electrical system architecture and intelligent networking characteristics.
Five, speed up the consideration of public transport and specific areas of electrification.
In the field of public transportation, vehicles have high fuel consumption and large pollution emissions, and the pollution emissions of each medium-sized fuel bus are 11.8 times that of passenger cars. The proportion of electric vehicles in public transportation and specific fields in China is low. According to preliminary statistics, by the end of 2019, there were more than 10 million vehicles in official business, urban public transport, road passenger transport, rental, network contract, sanitation, urban logistics and distribution, postal express delivery, airports, ports and mines, and the proportion of electric vehicles was less than 7%. Accelerating electrification is conducive to achieving multiple goals such as rapidly stimulating consumption, expanding industrial scale, reducing pollution emissions and reducing oil dependence on foreign countries.
In order to promote the electrification of public transport and specific areas and promote the consumption of new energy vehicles, this policy adjustment has increased support for the above areas, and the subsidy standard will not decline in 2020. When subsidizing capital settlement, the four ministries and commissions will comprehensively refer to the announcement, driving license, vehicle users, national monitoring platform and other multi-angle information, and conduct on-site verification to comprehensively determine the vehicle categories in various fields.
VI. Consideration and operation methods for setting the annual subsidy ceiling of 2 million vehicles.
The development of new energy automobile industry ultimately depends on the power of the market. In the early stage of industrial development, reducing the cost gap between new energy vehicles and traditional vehicles through subsidies will help to expand the scale and start the market quickly. With the continuous expansion of production and sales scale, there will be scale effect, the gap with traditional cars will be narrowed, and subsidies and other policies will be gradually withdrawn accordingly.
It is an international practice to set the upper limit of subsidy scale. The federal government of the United States stipulates that consumers will no longer enjoy the tax credit after the car companies with accumulated sales of more than 200,000 vehicles complete the slope retreat within one year. Britain, Germany and California set a ceiling on the total size of subsidy funds and adopt a first-come-first-served system.
With reference to international experience, China has set an annual upper limit of 2 million vehicles to support the promotion of new energy vehicles from 2020, accounting for about 8% of China’s total annual automobile sales. According to this scale, by 2022, the scale benefit of the new energy vehicle industry will be further improved, the comprehensive cost performance of products will be further improved, and with the effective relay of non-subsidy policies, the industry can gradually make a smooth transition to market-oriented development.
In terms of specific operation, according to the licensing data of new energy vehicles, when the annual sales volume is close to 2 million vehicles, the four ministries and commissions will issue a notice in advance to clarify the adjustment time of subsidy standards. At the same time, leave a transition period for enterprises to ensure a stable market.
Seven, set the price limit of 300 thousand yuan to consider and specific measures.
Drawing lessons from the practices of the United States, Germany, Britain, France and other countries, in order to avoid a large amount of subsidy funds flowing to luxury consumption, taking into account the purchasing power level of Chinese consumers, industrial development and other factors, this policy requires that the price of new energy passenger cars before subsidies should be below 300,000 yuan (including 300,000 yuan). In the specific implementation process, the four ministries and commissions will take the total amount of price and tax in the unified invoice for motor vehicle sales and the official guidance price of products as the reference basis. Relevant departments will include this in the scope of new energy vehicle subsidy liquidation verification, and enterprises that take subsidies in violation of regulations will be dealt with severely according to relevant regulations. In order to encourage the innovation and development of new business models such as "electricity exchange", the price limit requirement of 300,000 yuan is not implemented for new energy automobile products adopting the "electricity exchange" model.
Eight, adjust the fuel cell vehicle subsidies.
Since 2009, the four ministries and commissions have supported the promotion of fuel cell vehicles by giving consumers purchase subsidies. With the support of policies, by the end of 2019, China had promoted more than 6,500 fuel cell vehicles, built more than 50 hydrogen refueling stations, and formed more than 400 start-ups. The enthusiasm of social capital to invest in fuel cell vehicles was significantly improved. At present, the development of fuel cell vehicle industry faces some problems, mainly: lack of core technology and key components, weak innovation consciousness and ability; Insufficient infrastructure construction; The limitations of the subsidy policy on the consumer side in promoting the industrial chain and infrastructure construction are increasingly apparent.
In view of the problems existing in the industry, the current purchase subsidy policy for fuel cell vehicles is adjusted to select some cities to focus on key technologies of fuel cell vehicles, carry out demonstration applications of fuel cell industrialization, and form a development model of fuel cell vehicles with reasonable layout, different emphases and coordinated promotion. The demonstration will last for four years. During the demonstration period, the central government will reward the demonstration cities according to the results-oriented, and support local enterprises to carry out research and development of new technologies, industrialization, talent introduction and team building, and demonstration and application of new technologies in fuel cell vehicles.
IX. Specific measures to strengthen fund supervision
Enterprises and localities are responsible for the promotion and application of new energy vehicles. The local lead department for the promotion and application of new energy vehicles shall, jointly with other relevant departments, strengthen management, strictly implement the process of review, publicity and reporting, and simultaneously publicize the verification results on the portal website of the lead department for the promotion and application of new energy vehicles and the portal website of the Communication Clearing Center of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (www.miitcfc.cn), and indicate the publicity time, publicity link and other contents in the subsidy application materials. Failing to publicize or indicate as required, the four ministries and commissions will not accept the subsidy application materials reported by the local authorities.
The four ministries will further strengthen supervision and management. Clues involving fraud and fraudulent subsidies will be investigated and severely punished, and places and enterprises that lack supervision and cause fraudulent compensation will be dealt with severely according to regulations. The reporting telephone number is 010-68206302, the e-mail address is xnybz@miitcfc.cn, and the mailing address of paper materials is Communication Clearing Center of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, No.13 West Chang ‘an Street, Beijing, with the postcode of 100804.