Assistant Minister of Commerce Chen Jian attended and addressed the WAIPA Round-table Meeting in Xiamen on Sept. 9, and the full text was as the following:

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to take part in the Round-table Meeting for WAIPA, and I would like, on behalf of the Ministry of Commerce of the People's Republic of China and myself, to extend warm welcome to representatives from investment promotion agencies of 46 countries like Canada, Spain, Egypt and Argentina and from MOFCOM investment promotion agency. Meanwhile, let me express my sincere thanks to Kai Hammerich, the President of WAIPA, Nazha Benabbes Taaiji, Head for UNCTAD Department of Investment Promotion, for their participation to the Meeting. The Round-table Meeting for WAIPA is not only an important meeting during the 10th China International Fair for Investment and Trade but also another significant action for the Ministry of Commerce and WAIPA to further push forward the cooperation among investment promotion agencies of all countries.

Currently, countries all over the world are facing with a new round of increase of transnational direct investment worldwide, and the competition for international capital becomes intense day by day. It is of great meaning to discuss and study the capacity construction of investment promotion agencies and cooperation among the agencies. WAIPA provides a platform for the agencies of all countries to compete and cooperate for co-existence. Over 10-year experience of WAIPA proves that the investment promotion agencies of various countries cooperate with each other in more extensive fields with the development of economic globalization. In China, owing to the opening up in service trade, flow of international capital maintains increasing, and cooperation among agencies of all countries turns closer. Today, we sit together to communicate and share experiences and I believe that all the representatives here will learn something from the Meeting and I am willing to take this opportunity to brief the situation of China's attraction of foreign investment and overseas investment, the development and tendency faced by the career of investment promotion of China.

Foe 20 years of reform and opening up, China's economy maintained a rapid and healthy development, an all-dimensional, multi-tiered and wide-ranging opening pattern formed, and remarkable achievements in attraction of foreign investment and overseas investment obtained. By the end of June 2006, the actual use of foreign investment in China totaled US$650.8 billion, and the FDI hit US$272.1 billion, the international capital came from nearly 200 countries and regions, ranking top in the world as well as among developing countries for 14 years running. Meanwhile, overseas investment of Chinese enterprises increased with a high speed and totally over 9600 Chinese investment enterprises were set up overseas, overseas direct investment reached US$55 billion, locating over 160 countries and regions. Attraction of foreign investment plays an important role to promote the development of open economy of China, push forward technology innovation and advancement, speed up reorganization of state-own enterprises, reform and improve the socialist market economy system. To launch overseas investment helps Chinese enterprises to participate the international economic and technical cooperation and competition in a bigger scale and area and at a higher level, enhance the political and economic relations between China and other countries to contribute to the common development of a harmonious world.

International investment promotion is not only an organic part of the work of China's attraction of foreign investment and overseas investment, but also the important connector for combination between "Bringing in" and "Going Global". With the development of global transnational direct investment, investment promotion is playing a more and more significant role. Within so many years, Chinese Ministry of Commerce has always laid better investment promotion at the key place during the work of attraction of foreign investment and overseas investment, has always viewed "Bringing in" and "Going Global" as the two topics of international investment promotion and launched many relative works, actively took part in multi-lateral investment negotiations to expand the exchanges and cooperation with international organizations and overseas investment promotion agencies, provided a platform to promote two-way investment through a series of big investment promotion activities, special networks for investment promotion, professional products for investment promotion and diversified services for investment promotion, and meanwhile the Ministry also guided and promoted local areas to build up investment promotion agencies and hold exchanges and cooperation among the agencies.

Currently, China's work on attraction of foreign investment and overseas investment was confronted with new situation, regarding to attraction of foreign investment, the international competition was enhanced day by day and domestic demand for foreign investment changed sometimes, on the other hand, Chinese enterprises gradually upgraded their conditions to choose foreign investment enterprises. Now, transnational direct investment transferred to service industry, global research and study activities were developing to internationalization, only if we seize tightly the opportunities to take effective measures and take an active attitude towards the enhancement of international cooperation, take part in the international competition, could we improve the level of opening up and completely utilize the chance of a new round of global industrial structure adjustment to push forward the realization of the goal to build a well-off society in an all-round way.

As far as overseas investment is concerned, the capacity and wish of Chinese enterprises to invest overseas strengthened, but still many enterprises were in short of experiences, channel and information on overseas investment, the government and professional institutions should guide and assist Chinese enterprises to take a more active attitude to go out and participate the international competition, which was a great challenge for the work of investment promotion and the higher requirement put forward by Chinese investment promotion agencies.

In order to adapt to the new situation of China's opening up, effectively implement the strategy of China's investment promotion and improve the system of investment promotion, China Council For International Investment Promotion was established in Jan. 2006 after the approval of the State Council, and held the inaugural meeting on July 25 after the preparation for a half year, which was a big event in the process of development of China's investment promotion career. China Council for International Investment Promotion is a non-governmental organization for investment promotion, sponsored together by provinces, automobile regions, investment promotion agencies in national development areas, entrepreneurs committees and social intermediaries for promoting bilateral investment and trade cooperation, and institutional investors, having thousands of members.

The Round-table Meeting invites typical and successful investment promotion agencies among WAIPA members to introduce their experiences, which will not only enhance the information and experiences communication between WAIPA members and Chinese investment promotion agencies but also be beneficial to the future bilateral cooperation among agencies. I believe that through mutual efforts of all attendants, the Meeting will be in favor of investment promotion agencies of all countries to strengthen the self-construction, improve the level of investment promotion work and push forward the cooperation between Chinese investment promotion agencies and such agencies in other countries to develop to a higher level.

I would like to take this opportunity to recommend you China Foreign Investment Report 2006, it is the annual report issued by the Ministry of Commerce on the situation of China foreign investment for the forth time, analyzing exactly and comprehensively the situation of FDI attraction in main industries in China, mainly focusing on the hot topic concerning foreign investment in 2005 to elaborate, discussing and answering in details to the theories and policy questions in the area of foreign investment study such as development tendency of attraction of foreign investment, social responsibility of transnational companies and promotion of service outsourcing development during the eleventh five-year planning. And I believe that foreign investors and investment promotion agencies could understand and master the development status of China's attraction of foreign investment, China's policy direction on foreign investment and improvement of environmental protection through the report so as to further boost the confidence in investment in China.

(Source: Network Center of MOFCOM)

(Source: English Site of Mr. Chen Jian)