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| China's Entry into WTO A New Milestone |
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WED, DEC 12, 2001
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A month has passed since the Doha Meeting accepted China's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), and China became a formal WTO member Tuesday.
Chinese Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation (MOFTEC) Shi Guangsheng commented that the month was a period when "all the preparatory work went smoothly."
Starting from December 11, China will put into practice all the promises it offered for WTO accession. On the eve of China's WTO entry, MOFTEC publicized through its official website a compilation of the legal documents on China's accession to the WTO.
The newly-established MOFTEC Department of WTO affairs has already received large numbers of invitations to attend WTO lectures. Meanwhile the new MOFTEC Import and Export Fair Trade Bureau is busy studying relevant international regulations and practices.
China's revised anti-dumping and anti-subsidy regulations will become effective from January 1, 2002. The State Development Planning Commission has abolished 124 regulations concerning prices, and the Supreme People's Court has rectified about 1,200 judicial explanations.
The next WTO Director General Supachai Panitchpakdi, has predicted that China will draw up to 120 billion U.S. dollars of foreign investment in the next few years. While the global foreign investment decreased for the first time in the past 10 years, the foreign direct investment in China totaled 47 billion U.S. dollars this year.
According to WTO regulations, the United States, the European Union, Canada and Turkey will partly cancel their quotas on textile and clothing imports from China.
According to WTO rules, China will give most-favored-nation treatment to the other WTO members concerning goods trade, services and intellectual property rights, and will improve the transparency of its trade policies and relevant provisions.
Meanwhile, Chinese industries are facing all-round challenges in fields including banking, telecommunications, insurance and automobiles as well as services.
EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy called China's entry into the WTO a "Long March." China may need three to five years to become accustomed to the new situation, he said.
Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji called on all high-level officials to learn the WTO rules as soon as possible, in a bid to turn challenges into opportunities.
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