China needs to expand foreign investment scale

Over the past five years, around 30,000 to 40,000 new foreign investment projects have been approved in China every year, with an annual investment exceeding $60 billion.

The figures were 300 and $600 million respectively in the first five years after the country's adoption of the reform and opening-up policy in 1978. According to statistics released by the Ministry of Commerce, China absorbed $83.50 billion worth of foreign direct investment (FDI) last year, 91 times as much as that in 1983. The country has ranked No 1 among developing countries for 15 years in succession in terms of the scale of its FDI.

Foreign investment has long been a main fund source for the country's fixed asset investment. During the early period of reform and opening-up, in particular, the inflow of overseas investment did greatly help ease its serious fund shortage. At the same time, the rapid expansion of FDI also contributed a lot to the country's process of industrialization. Among all foreign investments, the industrial sector has taken more than 70 percent of the total.