China's efforts to implement the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement, which entered into force in February 2017, have resulted in impressive improvement in China's trade facilitation. The average time for customs clearance has been reduced to less than 20 hours for imports and less than two hours for exports. China has accelerated the establishment of a single window for international trade. By the end of 2017, the China International Trade Single Window had been connected to 11 authorities and agencies responsible for border control and covered basically all major import and export procedures. This one-stop system enables traders to use a single entry point to declare freight and taxes with a single submission of documents, and track the results after a single joint inspection by the participating authorities. It has accelerated the modernization of China's port management. China will further optimize supervision and management approaches, reform port administration regime and streamline procedures and reduce costs for import and export, to create a more business-friendly environment at the port.
3. Substantially widening market access for foreign investment
China has adopted a foreign investment administration model of pre-establishment national treatment plus negative list. This move marks an institutional reform in response to new developments in economic globalization and changes in international rules for investment. In September 2016, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress amended four laws including the Law on Foreign Invested Enterprises. For those foreign-invested enterprises not subject to the special administrative measures on access to foreign investment (the negative list), their establishment and changes are now administered by a "filing for record" approach instead of the examination and approval system. In the first half of 2018, revision of the negative list for foreign investment was completed and the "Notice of the State Council on Measures for Using Foreign Investment Actively and Effectively to Promote High-Quality Economic Development" was issued to further widen market access considerably. China is making efforts to steadily liberalize its financial sector, constantly open up the services industry, and deepen the opening-up of agricultural, mining and manufacturing sectors.
As regards the shipbuilding industry, China will lift foreign equity caps for companies engaged in the design, manufacturing and repair of vessels in 2018. Moreover, China will lift foreign equity caps on airplane manufacturing of trunk airliners, regional jets, utility aircrafts, helicopters, drones and lighter-than-air aircrafts. In the automobile industry, China will remove foreign equity caps on manufacturing of special-purpose vehicles and new-energy vehicles, and phase out those on all automotive ventures over the next five years.
