The Poster News APP:

Under the current situation, what favorable factors does China have in attracting foreign investment? What specific measures will be taken to maintain the current level of foreign investment, expand its quantity, and improve its quality? Thanks!

Meng Huating:

Thank you for your questions. As was introduced just now, under the joint efforts of all parties, we have achieved remarkable progress in attracting foreign investment in 2022, which laid a good foundation for relevant work in 2023. There are still many favorable factors for China to attract foreign capital. They can be summarized as the following four aspects:

First, the outlook for China's economic growth is promising. The fundamentals of the Chinese economy — its strong resilience, enormous potential, great vitality, and long-term sustainability — remain unchanged. The 20th CPC National Congress made a strategic deployment for China's economic development both in the immediate future and for some time to come, and the Central Economic Work Conference put forward clear requirements for promoting the overall improvement of economic performance this year. All localities and departments are actively devising measures to implement the deployment and requirements so as to achieve the goal of "ensuring steady growth and keeping employment and prices stable." Recently, a number of international organizations have raised their forecasts for China's economic growth this year. Economic growth means investment opportunities. Recent surveys by relevant institutions showed that most foreign-funded enterprises are very confident in China's economic outlook this year. Investors' confidence is our greatest strength in work.

Second, the Chinese market is becoming a stronger magnet for foreign capital. According to statistics from MOFCOM, more than 90% of foreign-funded enterprises in China are mainly targeting the Chinese market. With a population of more than 1.4 billion, China is the second-largest consumer market in the world. New forms and models of consumption continue to emerge, further unlocking the market potential. The Central Economic Work Conference required that the country prioritize the recovery and expansion of consumption this year. The market size will be further expanded, and foreign investors will have more motivation to invest in China.

Third, the synergy building through various policies is more evident. Since last year, MOFCOM, together with relevant parties, has issued the new Catalogue of Encouraged Industries for Foreign Investment and introduced a series of special policies to promote investment in manufacturing and encourage the development of foreign-invested R&D centers. This year, we will vigorously promote the implementation of these policies and introduce another batch of policies and measures according to the deployment of the central leadership. The synergy of existing and new policies will bring more sense of gain to foreign-funded enterprises.

Fourth, cross-border exchanges are more convenient. In the past three years, the pandemic impeded the cross-border flow of people and logistics, which was the most prominent problem encountered by foreign investors. Now, as China has entered a new phase of COVID-19 response, cross-border exchanges are becoming normalized. As you may have noticed, many local governments have recently organized activities overseas to attract foreign investment. It is believed that more foreign-funded projects will be implemented in China this year.

These are some favorable factors for attracting foreign capital. Now, I will briefly introduce our specific measures in 2023.

The 20th CPC National Congress and the Central Economic Work Conference made a series of important arrangements for promoting high-standard opening-up and making greater efforts to attract and utilize foreign investment. In the next step, we will resolutely implement the deployment of the central leadership and make every effort to deliver a satisfactory performance.

In terms of boosting newly-added foreign investment, we will work to cut the negative list for foreign investment in a reasonable manner and further expand opening-up in the modern service sector. Based on major economic and trading expos and various investment promotion mechanisms, we will support all localities to attract investment by combining the strategies of "going global" and "bringing in" and see that more iconic foreign investment projects are implemented.

In terms of stabilizing existing foreign investment, we will continue to leverage the role of the special task force for key foreign-funded projects under the foreign trade and investment coordination mechanism. We will strengthen regular communication with foreign-invested enterprises and foreign chambers and associations of commerce, help solve difficulties facing enterprises, and ensure national treatment for all foreign-invested enterprises. We will also improve the interdepartmental coordination mechanism of all levels for solving complaints from these enterprises and protect their rights and interests in accordance with the law so as to ensure the sound operation and development of existing foreign-invested enterprises.

In terms of improving the quality of foreign investment, we will work to communicate and implement a series of related policies and encourage localities and related government bodies to roll out detailed supporting measures. We will proactively guide more overseas investment towards sectors such as advanced manufacturing, modern services, energy conservation and environmental protection, and sci-tech innovation and toward the central, western, and northeastern regions. We will keep scaling up the efforts to attract investment in high-tech industries and continuously improve the quality and standard in attracting foreign investment.

Thank you.