A citizen walks past a screen at the Zhangjiang Hi-tech District Management Committee in Shanghai, east China, April 20, 2015. (Xinhua/Fang Zhe)
(ECNS) – China should concentrate on developing its four existing free trade zones (FTZs) instead of further expanding the pilot list, the Financial and Economic Affairs Committee (FEAC) of the National People's Congress (NPC) said on Wednesday.
The committee under China's top legislative body, the NPC, has conducted a study of China's pilot FTZs and distributed its findings to the members of the NPC's Standing Committee.
The FTZs are designed to promote reforms through a new round of more intensified opening up, the FEAC said in its report.
The government should surrender old mentalities and methods adopted during the development of economic special zones and industrial development zones, and carefully avoid creating preferential policy pools in the name of FTZs, it advised.
Both central and local governments need to reach a consensus on policy matters, and more efforts are needed to improve coordination among different government departments, as well as enhancing connection among the current four FTZs, it added.
In addition, the committee called for better design of policies and measures in order to make them more practicable.
China set up its first pilot FTZ in Shanghai in August 2013. On Tuesday, the establishment of another three FTZs was announced, to be located in the southern province of Guangdong, the northern city of Tianjin, and Fujian province in the southeast.
