Page 9 - ON BUILDING A HUMAN COMMUNITY WITH A SHARED FUTURE

OPENNESS AND INNOVATION

policy of opening up, and will pursue development in an open fashion. I
wish to make it clear to all that China will not close its door; we will only
become more and more open.
As practice has shown, opening up has been key to China’s economic
growth over the past 40 years and in the same way, greater openness is
the only way for China to achieve high-quality economic development in
the future. Opening up is a strategic decision made by China based on its
own need for development. It also represents a concrete step taken by
China to promote economic globalization in a way that benefits people
around the world.
In opening wider to the outside world, China will adopt the
following major measures.
First, we will significantly broaden market access. A number of
landmark measures are to be launched this year. Regarding services, and
financial services in particular, an important announcement was made
at the end of last year on measures to raise foreign equity caps in the
banking, securities, and insurance industries, and we will ensure that
these measures are implemented. At the same time, we will take stronger
steps toward opening up, moving faster to open the insurance industry,
ease restrictions on the establishment of foreign financial institutions
and expand their business scope in China, and open up more areas of
cooperation between Chinese and foreign financial markets. In terms
of manufacturing, the sector has already been basically opened up, with
only a small number of exceptions like automobiles, ships, and aircraft.
Now these industries are also in a position to open up. The next step is
to ease as soon as possible foreign equity restrictions in these industries,
automobiles in particular.
Second, we will create a more attractive investment environment.
The investment environment is like air, only when it is clean and fresh
can it attract more investment from outside. Whereas in the past China
relied mainly on favorable policies to attract foreign investors, we will
now have to rely more on ensuring a better investment environment.
We will enhance alignment with international economic and trade rules,
increase transparency, strengthen property rights protection, ensure
matters are handled according to law, and encourage competition and
oppose monopolies. We have established a number of new agencies,

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