Honorable Vice-Chairman Cheng Siwei, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,

Good morning!
　
It’s my great pleasure to attend the International CEO Roundtable of Chinese and Foreign Multinational Corporations. First of all, I would like to, on behalf of China’s Ministry of Commerce, express our heartfelt congratulations to the successful opening of the roundtable. I would also like to take this opportunity to share with you my views on the continuously deepening cooperation between China and multinational corporations.

The year 2008 is the 30th anniversary of China’s implementation of the reform and opening up policy. The past 30 years has witnessed China’s social and economic boom. China’s GDP and total trade volume rank the 4th and 3rd respectively in the world. The Chinese people, once inadequately fed and clad, are living a moderately prosperous life on the whole. The rural poverty-stricken population has dropped from 250 mn to 20-odd mn.

When we look back, we find out that one of the essential experiences is to unshakably deepen China’s reform and opening up and develop trade and economic cooperation with the rest countries of the world. In 1978, China’s total foreign trade value was less than US$20.6 bn; during the first ten months of 2007, it has reached US$1759.3 bn, which is expected to exceed US$2000 bn by the end of this year. By the end of last year, China’s actual use of accumulative total foreign investment had surpassed US$750 bn. China has established good cooperative relations with multinational corporations and 480 out of World Top 500 have made investments in China. Nearly 1000 R&D institutions have been set up by multinational corporations in China. Many multinational corporations present today have witnessed together with us the historical process of China’s reform and opening up and made active contributions to China’s economic growth and shared the fruit of China’s market expansion as well.

It is well known that multinational corporations are a major force of world economy today. Statistics shows that the total value of products produced by multinational corporations accounts for 1/4 of the world GDP, and their total trade volume takes up 70% of the world’s total. It is generally acknowledged that over a rather long period of time in the future, China shall remain one of the most active and fast-developing economies throughout the world, and therefore, it is a common choice to deepen the cooperation between China and multinational corporations. Multinational corporations are welcome to establish a long-term strategically cooperative relationship with China.

During the cooperation-deepening process, we hope to strengthen cooperation with multinational corporations on the following five aspects in particular :

1. To actively participate in China’s regional development and construction.

At present, China is implementing the regional development strategy, boosting the development of the western regions, revitalizing the northeast old industrial bases and accelerating the rise of China’s central regions. Compared with the east coastal region, China’s central and western regions have advantages in labor costs and land resources, and their infrastructure is being continuously improved and logistic cost reduced day by day, enabling the central and western regions to boast advantages for undertaking international industry transfer; some central cities are burgeoning into international manufacturing bases. According to the statistics of the first half year, China’s central and western regions have seen a sharp increase in foreign investment. Far-sighted foreign multinational corporations should take the lead in seizing the best opportunity in the process of China’s regional development and construction.

In order to encourage multinational corporations to invest in China’s central and western regions as well as the northeast old industrial bases, MOFCOM has implemented a series of policies and measures, such as supporting national economic and technical development zones of the central and western regions in order to strengthen infrastructure construction; conducting personnel training for undertaking industry transfer in the central and western regions; hosting Expo Central China and establishing Freight Express Channel that runs through the western region.

2. To strengthen cooperation with China in the fields of technological innovation.

China is striving hard to create an independent innovation-driven environment and build an innovation-oriented nation. Multinational corporations are welcome to develop new high-tech industry and establish more R&D centers in China to achieve common innovation and technical progress.

China shall provide better legal protection, policy support and market environment for multinational corporations, which develop technological innovation in China. China attaches great importance to the protection of intellectual property rights. We have regarded the IPR protection as a national strategy and established a sound legal system for IPR protection. The State Office of Intellectual Property Protection has worked with related departments to establish a mechanism for regular communication and coordination with foreign-funded enterprises. China’s law enforcement departments have also strengthened cooperation and interaction with foreign-funded enterprises in anti-infringement campaigns, which have attained a big success. We are willing to continuously offer even better services and assistance to the multinational corporations for cooperation with China in technological innovation.

3. To enhance cooperation with china in service outsourcing.

At present, the service outsourcing industry enjoys a rapid development throughout the world. It has become the important locomotive for a new round of worldwide industrial restructuring. The Chinese government attaches great importance to the service outsourcing industry. Currently, MOFCOM is working with related ministries and departments and endeavor to establish 10 service outsourcing bases with international competitiveness, promote the transfer of the multinational service outsourcing business with a certain scale to China and to quadruple the export volume of service outsourcing by the year 2010 on the basis of the figure of the year 2005. Up to now, MOFCOM has accredited 11 cities with proper conditions as “China’s Service Outsourcing Bases”, which include Beijing, Dalian, Xi’an, Shenzhen, Chengdu, Wuhan, Nanjing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Tianjin and Jinan.

Multinational corporations are the largest outsourcer and contractor of international service outsourcing. We hope that more and more multinational corporations shall consider China as their long-term strategic bases for undertaking service outsourcing business. Talented people are the key factor in service outsourcing development. Every year, there are 4-5 mn students graduating from colleges and universities in China, providing a large human resource reserve for the development of the high-end service industry, and therefore, China is fully qualified to become the most competitive service outsourcing base in the world.

4. To strengthen cooperation with China in product quality and safety.

This year, some foreign media have made quite a few negative reports on the quality and safety issues of China-made products. The Chinese government has paid high attention to product quality and safety. At present, we are launching a nationwide campaign of extensive special rectification on product quality and food safety in order to further improve the quality of China-made products.

The product quality and safety is a global concern. Multinational corporations shoulder important responsibilities in product design, raw material supply, finishing inspection, marketing and sales. It takes the strengthened international cooperation, concerted efforts of all parites concerned and joint responses to challenges to improve product quality.

5. Continue to play an exemplary role in fulfilling corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Multinational corporations bring to China capital, technology, advanced experiences of operational management as well as such advanced concepts as CSR and environmental liabilities. Currently, China is accelerating social development with focus on improving people’s livelihood, improving energy, resources, ecological and environmental conservation and enhancing China's capacity for sustainable development. We hope that the multinational corporations in China shall pay more attention to the economical and effective use of natural resources, ecological environmental conservation, upholding the laborer’s lawful rights and interests and, promoting the establishment of good business ethics, which, in turn, shall also benefit the long-term development of business operations of multinational corporations in China.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Since the implementation of China’s “going global” strategy, and China’s entry into WTO in particular, the internationalization of the Chinese enterprises has been tremendously improved. China’s outbound non-financial direct investment increased from US$2.7 bn in 2002 to US$17.63 bn in 2006. According to the UNCTAD statistics, China’s outbound investment in 2006 ranked the 18th in the world, which enabled China to be a rising outbound investing country with the rapidest growth. Some Chinese companies have grown into multinational corporations. In 2005, 16 Chinese companies were listed as members of the World Top 500 Enterprises, among which are the State Grid, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, China Mobile, China Construction Bank, Agricultural Bank of China, Shanghai Baosteel Group, to name a few, with their representative present at the conference today. In addition, China’s Haier, Lenovo, Huawei, ZTE, TCL, Hisense, etc. have also developed into international name brands by adopting international operation management.

I would also like to take this opportunity to extend my heartfelt wishes to the Chinese multinational corporations for achieving further development, and playing a more important role in the world economic arena. MOFCOM shall continue to provide support and services for Chinese companies making outbound investments and and conducting multinational operations.

Ladies and gentlemen,

The report to the recently concluded 17th National Congress of CPC reiterated that China shall unswervingly pursue the opening-up strategy of mutual benefits and win-win outcome, and continue to expand and deepen China’s opening up to the world. China is willing to work closely with all the rest nations of the world to advance the economic globalization in the direction of balanced development, shared benefits and win-win progress. We sincerely hope that the cooperation between China and multinational corporations shall make due contributions to realizing the aforesaid grand goal.

Thank you!