Taizhou is leading the nation in financial services offered to small and micro enterprises. [Photo/taizhou.com.cn]

Taizhou is leading the nation in financial services offered to small and micro enterprises.

As a city where private enterprise accounts for the lion's share of its GDP, Taizhou has rolled out a series of measures to ease financing problems facing small and micro enterprises, some of which have been promoted across the country.

As of the end of October, the total balance of small and micro enterprise loans in Taizhou was 341.312 billion yuan ($50.94 billion), accounting for 41.02 percent of total loans and exceeding the national and provincial average.

A credit information sharing platform for financial services has been implemented in Taizhou, according to Guo Liya, head of Luqiao Rural Commercial Bank.

The platform collects data related to the business conditions of enterprises from the departments of taxation, public security and justice. All of the data is made available to banks.

To date, the platform has collected more than 4,000 items of credit information in 118 categories, including electricity consumption, water consumption, tax payment and other important indicators that reflect the business conditions of enterprises.

The platform has greatly reduced the operating costs of banks and slashed the waiting time for lenders, Guo said.

Wang Qufei, head of the Taizhou branch of the People's Bank of China, said that the government should ensure markets play a decisive role in resource allocation but should take the initiative to do what the market cannot do.

A lack of guarantees is a common obstacle to the financing of private and small and micro enterprises.

To address the problem, the Taizhou government set up credit guarantee funds for private enterprises, small and micro enterprises, farmers and other market entities that lack guarantee sources.

The funds are non-profit and have an annual interest rate of just 0.75 percent, much lower than the market rate of 2 percent, according to Cao Yonghui, general manager of Taizhou credit fund operation center.

In addition, the borrowers won't be charged deposit or other fees.

In the meantime, proactive measures to prevent and control financial risks have been in place in the city, which is showing strong results.

Official data shows that as of the end of September, the non-performing loan ratio of the banking industry in Taizhou was only 0.75 percent, while the figure for small and micro business loans was only 0.8 percent.

The role of high technology in risk control is becoming increasingly prominent in Taizhou, which increases the sustainability of loans for small and micro enterprises.

In 2018, the rate of return on capital for Taizhou Bank and Tailong Bank, two major banks in Taizhou, was 28.69 percent and 21.32 percent, respectively.

Cao Guoqun, director of the Taizhou banking and insurance regulatory bureau, revealed that local authorities have also developed a digital financial platform which allows banks and enterprises to find each other online.

Cao said that more efforts will be made to promote the balanced development of financial services for small and micro enterprises and more local financial institutions including securities and insurance bodies will be mobilized.