On August 16, Li Yiqing, deputy representative of the Ministry of Commerce for international trade negotiations, introduced at the press conference of the State Council Information Office that it will continue to relax market access for foreign investment, revise and release the new version of the negative list for foreign investment access as soon as possible, realize the "zero" of restrictive measures in the manufacturing sector nationwide, and promote the orderly expansion of opening up in the fields of telecommunications, Internet, education, culture, and medical care.

Continue to relax market access for foreign investment

Li Qiaoqing, Deputy Representative for International Trade Negotiations of the Ministry of Commerce: As I said at the beginning, everyone is deeply impressed by the sentence in the decision of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, that is, "opening up is a clear sign of Chinese modernization". Attracting and utilizing foreign capital is an important part of our opening up to the outside world. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, China's foreign investment management system has achieved historic changes, promoting the scale of China's investment to reach new highs, and the quality of investment has also continued to improve. The Third Plenum of the CPC Central Committee has made a series of important arrangements related to foreign investment around "improving the high-level opening up system and mechanism", and the Ministry of Commerce will conscientiously implement the arrangements of the Third Plenary Session and launch a series of measures to encourage foreign investment.

The Ministry of Commerce will continue to relax market access for foreign investment, revise and release a new version of the negative list for foreign investment access as soon as possible, achieve "zero" restrictions in the manufacturing sector nationwide, and promote the orderly expansion of opening up in the fields of telecommunications, Internet, education, culture, and medical care. Promote the development of pilot demonstrations for the expansion and opening up of the service industry.

In addition, the Measures for the Administration of Strategic Investment by Foreign Investors in Listed Companies will be revised and promulgated to further relax the restrictions on foreign investors' strategic investment in listed companies, broaden the channels for foreign investment, and guide more high-quality foreign capital to enter the capital market for long-term investment.

Continue to build the "Invest in China" brand

We will continue to build the "Invest in China" brand, further improve the roundtable meeting and complaint mechanism for foreign-funded enterprises, guide local governments to improve the evaluation system for the effectiveness of foreign investment promotion, support all localities to focus on their own advantageous areas, carry out accurate, transparent and compliant investment promotion activities, and rely on the advantages of China's super-large-scale market to bring in more high-quality foreign investment.

Intensify the incentive policies, revise the "Catalogue of Encouraged Foreign Investment Industries", and further increase the encouraged items. Focus on advanced manufacturing, producer services, digital and intelligent technology, green technology applications and other related fields, and encourage greater investment in the central and western regions and the northeast.

In accordance with the requirements of the Third Plenary Session of the CPC Central Committee, the national treatment of foreign-funded enterprises will be implemented, and the national treatment of foreign-funded enterprises in terms of factor acquisition, qualification licensing, standard formulation, and government procurement will be guaranteed, and domestic and foreign-funded enterprises will be supported to participate in large-scale equipment renewal and government procurement without discrimination. We will also work with relevant departments to further improve the convenience of living in China, such as entry and residence, medical care and payment for overseas personnel, so that more foreign-funded enterprises can share the dividends of China's reform and opening up and promote win-win cooperation.

China's investment situation should be judged not only by quantity but also by quality

From the perspective of the scale of investment, from January to July, China's actual use of foreign capital exceeded 500 billion yuan. Affected by the high base in the same period last year, the scale of investment has decreased year-on-year, but it is still at a high level in the past decade. In particular, nearly 32,000 new foreign-funded enterprises were established, a year-on-year increase of 11.4%, continuing the trend of rapid growth of newly established foreign-funded enterprises since 2023, indicating that foreign investors are still optimistic about the long-term investment prospects in China.

From the perspective of investment structure, the proportion of foreign investment actually used in manufacturing and high-tech manufacturing from January to July increased by 2.9 and 2.6 percentage points respectively compared with the same period in 2023, reflecting the continuous optimization of the investment structure. It shows that foreign investors are actively adjusting the investment layout in related fields, which is in line with the general trend of accelerating the development of new quality productive forces and deepening the in-depth promotion of new industrialization in China.

From the perspective of the operating conditions of foreign-funded enterprises, data from the National Bureau of Statistics show that from January to June this year, the total profits of foreign-funded industrial enterprises above designated size increased by 11%, higher than the national average of 3.5%. The survey report of the United States Chamber of Commerce in South China also shows that the surveyed companies generally believe that they can achieve a higher return on investment in China, and nine out of ten U.S. companies are profitable in China. It shows that foreign-funded enterprises can not only enter, but also develop well in China, which is also an important driving force for multinational companies to continue to increase their investment in China.