Chinese premier chairs State Council executive meeting

BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Qiang on Friday presided over a State Council executive meeting that discussed trade in services, services consumption and other issues.

During the meeting, an action plan to improve the recycling system for used new energy vehicle (NEV) power batteries was approved.

The meeting said that China will adopt innovative measures to boost trade in services and fully apply a negative list for cross-border trade in services.

New opening-up measures will be introduced in fields such as telecommunication, education, culture, medical services and finance.

The country will boost exports of services and expand multilateral and bilateral cooperation, as well as regional cooperation on trade in services and digital trade.

The meeting also called for the high-quality development of services consumption, and stressed that the country should increase the supply of quality services through the comprehensive use of fiscal, tax and financial policies.

It highlighted efforts to build a normative, safe and effective recycling and utilization system for power batteries, as well as efforts to ensure that power batteries can be traced throughout their whole life cycle, covering production, marketing, disassembly and utilization.

Efforts should also be made to improve related administrative regulations, and to accelerate the development and revision of standards for the green design and carbon footprint accounting of batteries.

Noting that departments of the State Council have completed their handling of all suggestions and proposals submitted by lawmakers and political advisors last year, the meeting called for further efforts to handle this year's suggestions and proposals in a quality manner to garner broader public support for the country's high-quality development.