Officials unveil adjustments to allow easier access for foreign
China will continue to shorten the negative list this year to further improve its business environment for foreign investment as part of the country's efforts to open up its economy and pursue high-quality development, according to senior officials and experts.
The country will also introduce more opening-up measures for agriculture, mining, manufacturing and services and allow wholly foreign-owned enterprises to operate in more areas, said Ning Jizhe, vice-minister of the National Development and Reform Commission, on Wednesday.
"We will stay true to developing a high-level open economy, fully implementing the management system of pre-establishment national treatment and negative lists and taking measures to encourage foreign investment," Ning said at a news conference during the two sessions, the annual meetings of legislators and political advisers.
A negative list indicates areas where investment is prohibited; all other areas are presumed to be open. Pre-establishment national treatment is where foreign investors are treated the same as domestic ones in the early stages of setting up a business.
China has begun the revision of its negative list for foreign investment and will continue to carry out test programs for further opening-up in free trade zones, Ning said.
Li Gang, vice-president of the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, said as China's economy is transitioning to a phase of high-quality growth, the country needs to further push reform and expand opening-up.
"To break new ground in opening-up on all fronts, we need to further open the markets to foreign investment," Li said.
"Compared with the developed countries, there's plenty of room to shorten the negative list," he added.
Li said the key will be promotion of rules-based institutional reform, putting greater emphasis on opening-up based on rules and related institutions.
"In times of economic globalization, we can't afford to pursue development with the door closed," Li said."In fact, many of our industries are still on the low to medium tier compared with other leading countries. So we need to introduce and encourage more foreign investment to usher in more advanced manufacturing, modern services and other key sectors, which will help the country foster high-quality growth and innovative economic upgrading."