Photo: Huang Lanlan/GT

A launch ceremony for the 2026 "Shopping in China" and Spring Festival Consumption Season was held in Shanghai on Saturday to fuel consumption boom as the New Year's Day holidays have just wrapped up and the Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) holidays approach. Cities across China are brimming with vitality and a wave of consumption-promotion policies and activities at all levels is sweeping the country, expected to further expand domestic demand and boost consumer confidence amid the lunar year-end and holiday spending spree.

Co-hosted by the Chinese Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) and the Shanghai Municipal Government, this event aims to implement national strategies to expand domestic demand and stimulate consumption, thereby providing robust support for building a stronger domestic market, according to the organizers.

The ceremony unveiled a package of measures by the MOFCOM to stimulate consumption under "Shopping in China" campaign. These include holding promotional events nationwide focusing on three major themes - goods consumption, service consumption, and consumption scenarios, and organizing 15 pilot cities for international-level consumption environment development to hold related city-themed events.

"In the new year, the ministry will, in line with the arrangements of the Central Economic Work Conference, continue to closely integrate efforts to improve people's livelihoods with initiatives to boost consumption," Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao said in a speech at the ceremony.

Showcasing regional strengths and corporate commitments, city leaders and major enterprises attending the ceremony shared plans to fuel the nationwide consumption campaign through distinctive local offerings and substantial resource investments.

Mayors from Shanghai, Hangzhou, Wuhan, and Shenzhen detailed their respective  strategies. In their speeches, Shanghai Mayor Gong Zheng, for instance, outlined a Spring Festival Consumption Season plan, with districts of the city jointly offering over 100 million yuan ($14.3 million) in consumer benefits. Hangzhou Mayor Yao Gaoyuan highlighted technology products, more than 600 million yuan in vouchers for Spring Festival's consumption, and a packed 2026 event calendar.

Corporate representatives also shared their commitments and action plans for promoting consumption at the ceremony. For example, China Eastern Airlines plans to issue over 100 million yuan in aviation consumption vouchers globally, and China UnionPay announced plans to invest nearly 400 million yuan in benefits at the beginning of 2026, while also further optimize cross-border payment and tax refund services.

Industry insiders and experts reached by the Global Times view these timely and targeted measures across multiple levels as strong catalysts that can effectively boost consumers' willingness to spend and drive the growth across various industries.

The annual Central Economic Work Conference held in December vowed to vigorously boost consumption. The swift national and local actions launched at the beginning of 2026, such as the "Shopping in China" consumption promotions, represent a proactive effort to translate central policy decisions into concrete, on-the-ground implementation, said Wang Peng, an associate researcher at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences.

These policies and measures have lowered consumer costs through subsidies and innovations in consumption scenarios, expanding consumer choice, Wang said. Policy incentives have also stimulated market vitality, driving sales growth and creating opportunities for corporate transformation, he added.

Latest data from the New Year's Day holidays from Thursday to Saturday reflects the strong momentum of China's consumer market. In Beijing, the key enterprises monitored by the local commerce authority posted cumulative sales of 4.04 billion yuan, marking a year-on-year average daily increase of 16.3 percent, The Beijing News reported on Saturday. According to data sent to the Global Times by travel platform Qunar on Thursday, flight bookings to popular destinations rose 26 percent year on year, the platform said.

China's consumer market in 2026 has the potential to both expand and optimize, driven by forces including policy support, consumer demand and supply-side improvements, Wang said. "They foresee a virtuous cycle - policy guiding demand, demand compelling supply, and supply generating new demand - that will achieve the dual goals of scale expansion and structural optimization," Wang told the Global Times on Saturday.