Reform of state-owned energy enterprises: Enhance core functions and improve core competitiveness

The deepening and improving the reform of state-owned enterprises has been distinguishedState-owned enterprise reformfunctional mission and institutional mechanism tasks. forState-owned energy enterprisesIn other words, we must be guided by enhancing core functions and improving core competitiveness, and promote functional reforms oriented towards better serving the national strategy.

The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China pointed out that achieving high-quality development is the essential requirement of Chinese-style modernization and the primary task of comprehensively building a modern socialist country. State-owned enterprises are the "pillar" of the socialist economy with Chinese characteristics and play an important role in promoting high-quality development.

In terms of logical relationships, the relationship between state-owned enterprise reform and high-quality development is the relationship between means and results, and also between processes and goals. Judging from the reform of state-owned enterprises over the past 40 years, deepening the reform of state-owned enterprises can empower the high-quality development of state-owned enterprises, and the results of reform can be transformed into the dynamic driving force for high-quality development of enterprises, thereby promoting market-oriented reforms and improving market-oriented operating mechanisms, and promoting state-owned enterprises to continuously enhance their core functions and improve their core competitiveness in the deep integration with the market economy, and better serve national strategies.

The State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council proposed at the meeting of the heads of central enterprises held in December 2023 that it is necessary to implement the action to deepen and improve the reform of state-owned enterprises in depth. The meeting proposed to focus on the "six focuses" and enhance the "five aspects of value" also expresses the relationship between state-owned enterprise reform and high-quality development.

The "six focus" is the focus and reform direction of state-owned enterprise reform, namely, focusing on improving quality and efficiency, focusing on increasing scientific and technological innovation work, focusing on promoting layout optimization and structural adjustment, focusing on deepening the reform of state-owned assets and state-owned enterprises, focusing on enhancing the ability to support the strategic support, and focusing on preventing and resolving major risks.

"Five aspects of value" is the connotation of high-quality development of state-owned enterprises, that is, pay more attention to improving added value, pay more attention to improving functional value, pay more attention to improving economic added value, pay more attention to increasing the income and added value of strategic emerging industries, and pay more attention to enhancing brand value.

Focus on functional reform

The State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council clearly proposed that we should increase the efforts to coordinate reforms, grasp all key tasks with the spirit of nailing down nails, and strive to make greater breakthroughs in key areas, and strive to complete more than 70% of the main tasks of the deepening and improving state-owned enterprise reform by the end of 2024.

Looking ahead to 2024, the deepening and improvement action for the deepening and improvement of state-owned enterprises will start at a high starting point and a high-quality start - focusing on functional reforms oriented towards better serving the national strategy, and state-owned enterprises will give full play to the role of scientific and technological innovation, industrial control, and security support in building a modern industrial system and building a new development pattern, and give full play to the value of strategic functions.

Improve the scientific and technological innovation mechanism to better serve to achieve high-level scientific and technological self-reliance and self-improvement. State-owned enterprises should accurately grasp their strategic positioning in the overall situation of my country's scientific and technological innovation, strengthen the dominant position of enterprises in scientific and technological innovation, and enhance the leadership and global competitiveness of enterprises in scientific and technological innovation. We must highlight strategic orientation, strengthen internal and long-term value, improve the policy system and institutional arrangements for state-owned enterprises to build original technology sources, and strengthen basic, urgent, cutting-edge and disruptive technology research. Strengthen the in-depth integration of industry, academia and research led by enterprises, take the lead or participate in the construction of national innovation platforms such as national laboratories and national key laboratories, and strengthen in-depth cooperation with innovation entities such as scientific research institutes and universities. Actively open up innovation resources, provide technological traction and transformation support, actively carry out the first (set) equipment, first batch of materials, and first version of software applications, and promote the transformation of scientific and technological achievements. Actively participate in the construction of a high-level talent highland and a platform for attracting and aggregating talents, and accelerate the creation of a national strategic talent force for scientific and technological innovation.

Optimize the layout of the state-owned economy and better promote the construction of a modern industrial system. State-owned enterprises must adhere to the foundation of the real economy, actively lay out new industrial tracks, vigorously cultivate new development momentum, and promote the accelerated formation of a modern industrial system that is independent, controllable, safe, reliable, and highly competitive. We must make greater efforts to lay out forward-looking strategic emerging industries, increase investment in industries such as new generation information technology, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, new energy, new materials, high-end equipment, green and environmental protection, and make up for shortcomings and strengths in fields such as integrated circuits, industrial master machines, and key software. Give full play to the supporting and driving role of state-owned leading enterprises in the smooth circulation of industrial chains, launch the action of integrating industrial chain development, and promote basic solidification, technology complementation, optimization and shaping, and integration and strengthening of chains. Promote the deep integration of digital technology with enterprise production, operation and management, increase the research and development and promotion of green and low-carbon technologies, and promote the digital, intelligent and green transformation and upgrading of traditional industries.

Strengthen guarantees in key areas to better support national strategic security. State-owned enterprises should regard maintaining the security of industrial chains, supply chains and energy resources as their major mission and responsibility, and promote state-owned capital to further concentrate in areas related to national security, the lifeline of the national economy and the national economy and people's livelihood. We must strengthen the layout of key areas, and through market-oriented methods, strengthen the control position of the state-owned economy in the fields of national defense and military industry, energy resources, and food supply, and increase the effective supply of public services in the fields of people's livelihood such as medical and health care, health care, disaster prevention and mitigation, and emergency guarantee. Enhance the role of supporting important energy resources, strengthen the domestic exploration and development of important energy and mineral resources, increase storage and production, promote the diversification of oil and gas resources imports, and enhance control over transportation channels. Strengthen the construction of important infrastructure, increase investment in the construction of new infrastructure, and maintain basic network security such as energy, transportation, and communications.

Focus on creating a modern new state-owned enterprise with the "four new" situation. On the basis of consolidating and deepening the results of the three-year action plan for deepening the reform of state-owned enterprises, we must seize the opportunity to deepen institutional and mechanism reform, promote state-owned enterprises to truly operate according to market-oriented mechanisms, and strive to create modern new state-owned enterprises with new development methods, new corporate governance, new operating mechanisms, and new layout and structure. First, deepen reforms around optimizing resource allocation and further increase efforts in market-oriented integration and restructuring. We will adhere to the principle of taking enterprises as the main body and marketization as the means, highlight the main business and focus on industry, pay more attention to strengthening and specializing, promote the integration and restructuring of state-owned enterprises, orderly advance and retreat, improve quality and efficiency, and enhance the ability to serve national strategies as a whole. Second, deepen reforms around improving vitality and efficiency, and further improve the modern corporate governance and market-oriented operation mechanism of state-owned enterprises with Chinese characteristics. Implement the reform of the three systems more widely and deeply, comprehensively build a new business responsibility system under the modern enterprise system with Chinese characteristics, improve a more accurate, flexible, standardized and efficient income distribution mechanism, and stimulate the enthusiasm, initiative and creativity of cadres and employees at all levels to do things and start businesses. The third is to deepen reforms around improving regulatory services and further improve the state-owned assets supervision system that focuses on capital management. Improve the coordination mechanism for the integration and coordination of various types of supervision such as intra-party supervision, with investor supervision and discipline inspection and supervision, inspection supervision, audit supervision, financial and accounting supervision, and social supervision, and strengthen internal supervision of enterprises. Improve the management of the list of rights and responsibilities, dynamically optimize authorization matters, build a digital and intelligent supervision system that is connected from top to bottom, real-time online, and improve the scientific, targeted and effective nature of state-owned assets supervision.

Professional integration highlights industry leadership

Most state-owned energy enterprises have characteristics involving national security, the lifeline of the national economy, and public services. They must be in mind the "big things of the country", firmly grasp the mission and tasks of state-owned enterprises in the new era and new journey, and unswervingly promote the strengthening, improving and expanding. Focusing on serving the national strategy, we focus on enhancing core functions, focusing on value creation, and achieving the organic unity of economic, political and social attributes in achieving high quality, so as to better play the strategic supporting role of the state-owned economy.

The deepening and improving state-owned enterprise reform action distinguishes the functional mission and institutional and mechanism tasks of state-owned enterprise reform. For state-owned energy enterprises, we must focus on the following aspects.

First, we must ensure energy security and security, unswervingly promote the revolution in energy production and consumption, and accelerate the construction of clean and low-carbon, safe and abundant, economical and efficient, coordinated supply and demand, flexible and intelligentNew energy system, build a new energy system, build a digital and intelligent high-efficiency power grid, adhere to the system concept, and achieve multi-target balance.

The second is to deepen the optimization of layout and structural adjustment, and implement the "three concentrations" of state-owned capital in the energy field. We must take serving the "dual carbon" goal as a strategic guide, accelerate the transformation and development of green and low-carbon, promote digital and intelligent energy production and power grid construction, deepen the construction of carbon management systems, and strengthen digital and intelligent support.

The third is to grasp the strategic support of high-level scientific and technological self-reliance and self-improvement, and unswervingly improve independent innovation capabilities. Strengthen core technology research and accelerate the development of new quality productivity; give full play to the advantages of the new national system, improve the resilience and control of the industrial chain and supply chain; deepen and improve the scientific research management mechanism, and continuously stimulate the vitality of all factors.

Fourth, we will unswervingly continue to deepen reforms, implement all arrangements for deepening and improving the reform of state-owned enterprises, promote better realization of functional mission tasks through institutional and mechanism reform, and better promote the development of productivity through adjustment and improvement of production relations. Better reflect the strategic functional value of the enterprise; implement the requirements of the reform of the power and energy system to better serve the construction of a unified national market; deepen the reform of internal systems and mechanisms to better increase momentum and efficiency.

In recent years, professional integration and reorganization have become the "highlight" of deepening state-owned enterprises. State-owned enterprises have increased their efforts in market-oriented integration and restructuring around optimizing resource allocation, insisted on taking enterprises as the main body and market-oriented as means, highlighted their main business and focused on industry, paid more attention to strengthening and specializing, promoted the integration and restructuring of state-owned enterprises, orderly advance and retreat, quality and efficiency improvement, and enhanced their ability to serve national strategies as a whole.

On January 6, 2024, China Huaneng signed 22 projects with 13 central enterprises including China Shipbuilding, China National Offshore Oil Corporation, Oriental Electric Group, China Aluminum Corporation, General Technology Group, China Construction, China Merchants Group, China Building Materials, China CRRC Group, China Communications Construction Group, Nanguang Group, China Electric Equipment, China Tower and other 13 central enterprises. The signing of the contract is carried out in the "on-site + video" method, involving photovoltaic power generation and wind power projects, with a total capacity of 288 megawatts. It is a professional integration with a wide range of projects and a large number of projects in the new energy field of central enterprises in recent years. The signing parties will carry out smart operation and maintenance service cooperation through various channels such as resource sharing, business collaboration, online services, and management improvement to promote the improvement of the quality and efficiency of the new energy industry of central enterprises.

In 2024, the efforts to reorganize and integrate state-owned enterprises will continue to increase. Central enterprises (and local state-owned enterprises) will focus on advancement, retreat, integration and integration, and implement professional integration projects as the starting point, and continue to carry out reorganization and integration in depth. While promoting the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries, we will accelerate the development of emerging industries. At the beginning of the new year, three central enterprises have carried out market-oriented asset integration and reorganization using listed companies such as China Tungsten High-Tech, Baosteel Co., Ltd., and Guangsheng Nonferrous Metals as platforms.

The professional integration of state-owned energy enterprises will further highlight industrial leadership, so as to further promote the layout optimization and structural adjustment of the state-owned economy in the energy field, and promote state-owned capital to continue to concentrate in important industries and key areas related to national security and the lifeline of the national economy, and to provide public services, emergency capacity building and public welfare, and to focus on forward-looking strategic emerging industries. These industries are closely related to the energy industry. The State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council clearly proposed that it is necessary to increase the professional integration efforts in new energy, mineral resources, main pipeline networks, ports and terminals, and promote the rational flow and optimized allocation of state-owned capital. Therefore, the new energy field should be a key area for the professional integration of state-owned energy enterprises in 2024.