Nation eyes trade opening initiatives

 Shanghai FTZ's key tasks ahead include reforms, raising investment

China will step up negotiations on free trade agreements as a move to deepen the country's economic opening and enhance its competitiveness, Commerce Minister Gao Hucheng said on Friday.

"China's pilot free trade zone in Shanghai serves primarily as a trial to develop a mechanism that can be applied and generalized in expanding the country's opening-up in the next stage," Gao told a news briefing on the sidelines of the 12th National People's Congress.

"Preliminary evaluation of the FTZ over the past five months is positive," Gao added.

After the pilot zone was launched in late September, many provincial and municipal governments sought approval for similar zones.

But the minister noted that the pilot zone is focusing on innovation of mechanisms and systems, rather than the preferential policies seen in industrial parks established over the past three decades.

He added that the key tasks for the Shanghai pilot are transforming government functions, easing investment approvals and promoting investment and trade (especially in the service sector) and financial reforms.

"We're in close communication with other departments and local governments. We will develop, as soon as possible, experience that can be duplicated and generalized, based on the evaluation of the pilot FTZ, especially the review of the 'negative list' and the supervision system," Gao said.

Zhang Yansheng, secretary-general of the Academic Committee of the National Development and Reform Commission, said that the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone has served as a trial for China to establish high-quality free trade agreements.

"The innovations in the Shanghai FTZ are intended to explore an administrative system that's in line with high-standard global investment and trade rules, building up a foreign investment management system in line with global practices."

He added that new regional trade and investment arrangements have emerged since the financial crisis, posing challenges for China.

"The country must transform these challenges into driving forces for a new round of high-standard reforms and opening-up at home," Zhang said.

Premier Li Keqiang said on Wednesday in the Government Work Report that "we will foster a new open-economy system and advance a round of opening-up to embrace the international market.

"This will lead to deeper reforms and structural adjustment and enable us to enhance China's capacity to compete internationally".

The commerce minister said that regional trade and investment agreements are advantageous supplements, or even improvements, to the multilateral trading system.

China remains as an active participant and founder of the multilateral trading system under the World Trade Organization.

China will actively participate in developing high-level free trade areas; continue negotiations on investment agreements with the United States and the European Union and accelerate free trade area negotiations with South Korea, Australia and the Gulf Cooperation Council, according to the Government Work Report.

The country will also strive to make progress on agreements concerning trade in services, government procurement and information technology, and speed up negotiations on new areas such as environmental protection and e-commerce.

Addressing the progress of the China-Australia free trade agreement, the commerce minister said that the outlook is optimistic.

China in 2013 signed free trade agreements with Switzerland and Iceland, the first such pacts the country signed with developed economies.

Along with China's free trade agreement initiatives, 12 economies, including the US, Japan and Vietnam, are pursuing the Trans-Pacific Partnership in the Asia-Pacific region.

"The talks for the TPP are very important negotiations and China is closely watching the negotiations while staying in communication with major countries such as the US," the commerce minister said.

He didn't say whether China has started talks to join the TPP, only noting that the government takes an "inclusive and open attitude" to different trade and investment arrangements.