Opening-up to further boost global recovery

A smart container terminal at Tianjin Port in North China's Tianjin on Jan 17, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua]

China's unswerving push for high-level opening-up will boost confidence in and create new growth engines for world economic recovery, according to global business leaders and analysts.

They commented on Thursday, a day after President Xi Jinping called for more efforts to further promote innovation, uphold true multilateralism and reinvigorate trade and investment.

Foreign business leaders said they will continue to increase investment in China, a crucial market for their global operations, as the business environment is expected to further improve.

Their remarks followed the speech that Xi made via video link on Wednesday, addressing the conference on the 70th anniversary of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade and the Global Trade and Investment Promotion Summit.

"I wish to reiterate that China's resolve to open up at a high standard will not change, and that the door of China will open still wider to the world," Xi said, adding that China will continue to foster an enabling business environment based on market principles, governed by law and up to international standards.

The nation will pursue high-standard implementation of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership agreement and high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, and offer more market, investment and growth opportunities to the global business community, he said.

At a sideline forum of the summit on Thursday, Ren Hongbin, chairman of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, noted that Xi has reiterated that China will expand high-level opening-up and advance cooperation with others to make more contributions to global economic recovery.

"China always pays intense attention to facilitating the operations and growth of foreign companies," he said, adding that the continuous improvement of China's business environment boosts the confidence and expectations of foreign investors.

Michael Hart, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, said at the sideline forum that greater market access and reciprocal arrangements between countries are needed for enterprises to make better decisions on new investments.

Hart added that members of the chamber wish for closer cooperation between China and the United States.

Yu Jeoung-yeol, president and CEO of the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency, said, "I believe that China's technology and investment cooperation and win-win cooperation among countries or enterprises are the ways to jointly cope with future crises to realize development together."

Zhang Jianping, head of the Center for Regional Economic Cooperation at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, said that he expects China to roll out more measures to further the implementation of the RCEP agreement, improve the business and investment climate on a par with high-level standards, and accelerate establishment of a unified and fully open domestic market, as part of the nation's efforts to expand high-standard opening-up.

China is also expected to promote globalization and multilateralism with more concrete actions to share its development dividends with the rest of the world, he said.

Xu Yang, president of Danfoss China, said the nation's firm pursuit of green and sustainable development, together with the economic upgrades and transformation, will bring more growth opportunities for foreign investors.

Jerry Zhang, CEO of Standard Chartered Bank (China), said that the bank has seen a new wave of Chinese investments into the Association of Southeast Asian Nations since the RCEP agreement took effect on Jan 1, especially in the clean technology, manufacturing and e-commerce sectors.

Jiang Xueqing contributed to this story.