China will implement a unified negative list nationwide next year, after which all companies operating in China will enjoy the same market access conditions, industry website cfi.cn reported on Monday, citing a senior Chinese official.
Regardless of whether they are State-owned or private, domestic or foreign, large or small, all enterprises in China will be "treated equally in rights, opportunities and regulations" under the new approach, Yi Gang, vice president of the People's Bank of China, the country's central bank, said in the article, which elaborated the reports from the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.
Foreign investment relating to national security should undergo a security review based on relevant laws, according to Yi.
Yi noted that the pilot projects for carrying out the negative list approach in four free trade zones in Shanghai, North China's Tianjin, East China's Fujian Province and South China's Guangdong Province have "achieved positive results," with the market playing a bigger role in resource allocation.
Also, the number of items listed in the negative list for foreign investment in the four trade zones have been reduced from 190 in 2013 to 95 in 2017, according to Yi.
