Opening-up boosts Belt and Road Initiative

The section on opening-up China to the world promotes the Belt and Road Initiative, its objectives and projects. The government plans to "expand industrial capacity cooperation with other countries, and with this enable Chinese manufacturing and Chinese services to go global", seemingly underscoring how the government sees the Belt and Road Initiative as a conduit for the global expansion of China's companies.

There was also language on opening up China's own markets, with plans to "strengthen alignment with international business rules", and "completely opening up" the general manufacturing sector. The GWR re-iterated commitments to expand the access of foreign companies to sectors such as telecommunications, medical services, education, elderly care and new-energy vehicles and to ease the restrictions on the share of foreign equity in sectors such as banking, securities, fund management, futures and financial asset management.

The GWR also repeated China's support for economic globalization and protecting free trade, with a readiness to advance multilateral trade negotiations, conclude the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership and build the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific and the East Asia Economic Community.

In all, the GWR confirms that the shift toward the greater emphasis on quality and equality over quantity heralded at the 19th Party Congress is planned to start in practice in 2018, albeit subtly and gradually.

The author is head of Asia Economics, Oxford Economics.