The Third Plenum: China to Expand Institutional Opening-up and Market Access

Fu Rui/China Youth Daily

Will China continue to open to the outside world? How will China continuously attract foreign investment and improve its market environment? There are some answers for watchers and investors who keep an eye on China, the world's second-largest economy.

The Press Conference on the Third Plenum was held by Central Committee of the CPC in Beijing on July 19. Photo by: Fu Rui

"China will continuously improve its market-oriented, rule of law, and international business environment. China is willing to share with foreign-invested enterprises the opportunities embedded in the development of new-quality productive forces and the advancement of Chinese modernization. We are delighted to see foreign-invested enterprises growing together with China's economy." said Han Wenxiu, Director of the Office of the Central Leading Group for Rural Work, at the Press Conference of the Central Committee of the CPC on July 19.

“Opening-up is a basic state policy,” said Han, "foreign-invested enterprises are participants and contributors to China's economic development.” Han noted that changes in the international environment lead a temporary decline in China's actual utilization of foreign investment. However, with the continuous improvement of the business environment, China's utilization of foreign investment is believed to keep rising.

Han illustrated that the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China had made arrangements for advancing high-standard opening-up and increasing the utilization of foreign investment.

Firstly, China will steadily expand institutional opening up. China will proactively align with international economic and trade rules, and achieve mutual recognition and compatibility in rules and management in property rights protection, industrial subsidies, environmental standards, labor protection, government procurement, e-commerce, finance and other areas. China will also establish an efficient, convenient, and secure mechanism for cross-border data flows, and create a transparent, stable, and predictable institutional environment. Recently, unilateral visa-free policies for some countries have achieved good results. Systems for people coming to China for business and tourism will be further improved, including accommodation, medical care and payment facilities.

Secondly, China is committed to expanding market access. The catalog of industries encouraged for foreign investment will be expanded, and the negative list for foreign investment will be reasonably reduced. Service sectors will be further opened, and a negative list for cross-border service trade will be fully implemented. China will also promote the opening up in the fields of telecommunications, the internet, education, culture and healthcare, and accelerate the development of offshore trade.

Thirdly, China will guarantee the national treatment, legitimate rights and interests of foreign-invested enterprises. China will ensure that foreign-invested enterprises receive national treatment in terms of resource acquisition, qualification licensing, standard setting, government procurement, and other aspects. In recent years, many cases have emerged in various localities in protecting the trade secrets and intellectual property rights of foreign-invested enterprises, effectively safeguarding the rights and interests of foreign investors.

来源：中国青年报客户端