An inspiring roundtable discussion took place on September 4. Liu Meiying, one of the top officials with the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Commerce, introduced the basic information of the China (Beijing) Pilot Free Trade Zone and the Integrated National Development Zone for Opening up the Service Sector, as well as the two zones' pioneering and innovative policies. She then took questions from several representatives from a dozen chambers of commerce in China.

These business leaders called for more concrete measures in Beijing and across China to implement the 24-Point Guideline. On August 13, China issued the guideline to further optimize the foreign investment environment and strengthen efforts, including 24 specific measures in six aspects, to attract foreign investment. For example, the government will provide convenience for foreign executives, technical personnel and their families in terms of entry, exit and residence in the country, the document reads.

Trade and investment sometimes depend on individual experiences, Rex Chen, CEO of the China-Australia Chamber of Commerce, said at the roundtable, adding he hoped to see more opening-up measures in the months to come.

The roundtable was part of the 10th China Inbound-Outbound Forum hosted by the Center for China and Globalization (CCG), a Beijing-based think tank, on the sidelines of the 2023 China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS).

The CIFTIS is the largest specialized fair of its kind in the world. Themed Opening up Leads Development, Cooperation Delivers the Future, the 2023 CIFTIS took place in Beijing from September 2 to 6 and featured over 200 events, including forums, negotiations and meetings. More than 1,100 outcomes were achieved this year, according to organizers.

Eighty-three countries and international organizations participated in the fair, and more than 2,400 and 6,700 companies took part in offline and online exhibitions, respectively. Unlike trade in goods, trade in services refers to the sale and delivery of intangible products such as transportation, finance, tourism, telecommunications, construction, advertising, computing and accounting.

Opening up 

"The world today is confronted with accelerated changes unseen in a century and sluggish economic recovery," Chinese President Xi Jinping remarked in his address to the Global Trade in Services Summit of the 2023 CIFTIS via video link on September 2.

Xi stressed the importance of trade in services as a key component of international trade, underscoring the vital role of the sector in economic and trade cooperation among nations. He further emphasized that deepening global cooperation in trade in services and the services sector, accelerating the process of digital-driven, smart and green growth, and the emergence of new technologies and new business forms and models can all provide strong impetus to "advancing economic globalization, reviving global growth and enhancing the resilience of world economic development."

Noting that this year marks the 45th anniversary of China's reform and opening up, Xi reaffirmed the country's commitment to promoting high-standard opening up and advancing Chinese modernization "on all fronts through high-quality development, thereby providing all countries with new opportunities for openness and cooperation."

The services sector now sits at the center of China's high-standard opening-up strategy. Numerous policies—from optimizing the business environment to promoting fair competition—have been implemented to intensify the industry's openness, according to a report released at a CIFTIS forum on the progress of trade in services on September 3.

Take Beijing as an example. Since the launch of the China (Beijing) Pilot Free Trade Zone and the Integrated National Development Zone for Opening up the Services Sector in August 2020, 49 pioneering and innovative policies have been implemented there. The robust development of the two zones, with the latter covering the entire capital city, has contributed to the city's greater opening up, where accumulative paid-in foreign investment amounted to $55.14 billion and 5,367 foreign-funded enterprises were added in the past three years.

For example, a supporting policy constitutes a maximum of 50 million yuan ($6.85 million) in financial support for world-class projects of foreign-funded research and development (R&D) centers in Beijing, and a maximum of 20 million yuan ($2.74 million) in financial support for expanding and upgrading foreign-funded R&D centers, according to Liu. "We provide foreign investors with tangible benefits," she added.

While foreign business leaders all welcomed Beijing's efforts to boost its services sector and trade in services, they still expected more supportive policies. Jens Hildebrandt, Executive Director of the German Chamber of Commerce in China-North China, said at the roundtable discussion that he looks forward to seeing more detailed measures for the implementation of the 24-Point Guideline in areas such as the opening up of the public procurement market, particularly those concerning the creation of fast-track channels for foreign-funded enterprises.

Noah Fraser, Executive Director of the Canada China Business Council, underlined foreign-funded companies' need for "more facilitation in Chinese visa application procedures."

Other participants, including Tom Hoogendijk, President of the Benelux Chamber of Commerce in China, and Denis Simon, President of the Alliance of Global Talent Organizations, also articulated their hopes that the 24-Point Guideline will be implemented to the fullest, given it "has the potential to further increase predictability in investment and reduce misgivings about investment."

Confidence 

During the first seven months of this year, China's trade in services maintained steady growth, rising more than 8 percent year on year to 3.67 trillion yuan ($505.4 billion) in total import and export volume, data from the Ministry of Commerce showed.

Moreover, China had expanded its share of global commercial services exports from 3 percent in 2005 to 5.4 percent in 2022, according to a report jointly released by the World Bank and the World Trade Organization in July.

"China is actively promoting high-quality development through high-standard opening up," Vice Minister of Commerce Wang Shouwen said at the September 3 forum. "In developing the services sector and trade in services, China will work with all other countries and parties to advance inclusive development through openness, including easing market entry and accelerating negotiations on the negative list for trade in services and investment." This particular list is used to define industries in which foreign companies cannot invest and specifies restrictions or bans on certain types of foreign investment.

The growing Chinese market rings in new opportunities for other countries.

Last year, over 140,000 Chinese students went to study in the United Kingdom. And many British schools today intend to expand their collaboration with Chinese institutions, Geraldine McCafferty, Deputy Head of Mission, British Embassy Beijing, said at the CCG forum. "In multiple trade facets, the UK and China can work together," she added.

(Print Edition Title: Across the Biz Board) 

Copyedited by Elsbeth van Paridon 

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