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On December 11, 2001, China officially joined the World Trade Organization (WTO), making the dream of several generations of Chinese people come true. Since then, looking back at what happened, Pascal Lamy, director-general of the WTO, gave an “A+” rating for China’s performance in the WTO in the past ten years.
On November 15, 1999, China and the U.S.A signed the bilateral agreement. On May 18, 2000, China reached an agreement with the European Union. These two agreements eradicated the largest obstacle for China in joining the WTO. In 2001, Shi Guangsheng, then the Minister for Foreign Trade in China, signed the agreement on China’s joining the WTO. From submitting the application on July 10, 1986, to finally joining the WTO, China went through 15 years of negotiations and meetings. Zhu Rongji, former Chinese premier, once said that he and his contemporaries would see their hair turn grey before hearing of China joining the WTO.
More Challenges than Opportunities
Most people do not understand the difficulties and unease during the negotiations of the WTO. When recalling the current situation, Zhang Xiangchen, director of the research office of China’s Ministry of Commerce, said:“The biggest difficulty at that time was whether joining the WTO would bring us benefits or harm. Some of us worried that the auto industry and tariff in China would be affected after joining this organization. Fortunately, 10 years have past and our worries never became a reality.”
In order to make more precise judgments, Zhang Xiangchen and his colleagues spent a lot of time and energy on analysis and forecasting and proved that joining the WTO was a correct move for China. This reassured people present at the negotiation. However, as Zhang Xiangchen said, the correct move did not mean that there were no problems. For example, there were disputes over reducing or completely removing tariffs for some products. The result proved that it would be unimaginable if the tariffs for some products were completely removed.
It is not an exaggeration to say that China went through complete changes after joining the WTO; the country began to improve in all respects and began to be integrated into the world; its strength went up and the reform deepened; it has become more international- ized and the Chinese government and enterprises have passed the test.
It is worthwhile to mention that China has developed from the 9th largest economy to the 2nd largest economy in the past ten years. According to data from the World Bank, the economic growth rate of China exceeded 10% in 2010 and accounted for 25% of global economic growth. Thus, China has been the engine of global economic growth for two straight years. Wang Xinkui, president of Shanghai WTO Affairs Consultation Center, is a good witness of the changes in China in the past ten years after joining the WTO. He recalled that the whole country was cheered up by the news that China had joined the WTO in 2001.“In the first ten years after joining the WTO, China faced more opportunities than challenges. Then, in the next ten years, China had to face more challenges than opportunities,” said Wang Xinkui. He thought that the Chinese economy still had a lot of uncertainties due to its fast development. For example, China took the place of Japan as the second largest economy in the world in 2010, but China was far behind Japan in its number of multinationals and global brands.
An example Wang Xinkui listed was that China was the champion in export capacity, with Germany in the second place. But if we check the export volumes of these two countries carefully, we will find that the value of commodities exported from Germany is much higher than the ones from China. Wang Xinkui said that the data sometimes could be deceptive and Chinese people should not be blinded by some glorious data. “We need a clear mind to make a correct judgment of our role in the world and the global economic situation before making the right decision. It is worthwhile to mention that China should not neglect the development of multinationals after going through 20 years of fast economic development and globalization, which created the current economic and trade situation dominated by global enterprises. Reports from different institutions showed that multinationals were still the most active elements in the global financial economy. In China, ZTE and Huawei are typical representatives of Chinese multinationals that experienced development after China joined the WTO. However, there are quite few companies like these two in China.
Actually, “joining the WTO” meant the “arrival of wolves” for many Chinese before 2001. At that time, many Chinese domestic enterprises thought foreign companies could cross the lowered tariff and trade barrier and directly compete with them. But the result proved that there was a two-way influence. On the one hand, “joining the WTO” opened up quite a large number of industries to foreign companies and brought great stress for the Chinese
companies. On the other hand, Chinese companies have gained a lot of precious experiences from the competition with foreign companies and thus grew up.
Concepts of WTO Widely Accepted In China, almost every person knows what the WTO is, showing that the concepts of this organization have been widely acknowledged.
“In the past ten years after joining the WTO, China became a beneficiary of economic globalization,” said Shen Dayong, deputy director of the International Economy and Trade Institute at the Shanghai Institute of Foreign Trade. In his opinion, the economic development China gained from joining the WTO is much more than expected. It also accelerated the systematic reform and the change of government functions in China. For example, the government learnt to open and clarify the political affairs and financial system after joining the WTO. These changes have been silently incorporated into the lives of ordinary people. The most obvious change is the balance between rights and obligations, which gradually changed the way of thinking.
However, Shen Dayong also worried about a series of changes that had happened in the past ten years. Presently the U.S.A, Europe and Japan are all going through slow economic development. China, as one of the emerging economies, is co-existing and competing with Brazil, India, South Africa and other developing countries. The cheap labor force, which was a forceful weapon of China in the past ten years, is no longer to the advantage of Chinese enterprises. Another problem is quite haunting as well. Presently the income of Chinese people is not in tune with the economic development of China. “For example, a girl who graduates from university cannot find a job. But her mother, a 50-year- old lady, could easily find a job as a babysitter or hourly employee and her salary could be between 3000 and 4000 yuan per month, the same as a white collar’s monthly salary. This is a typical case for the increasing cost of simple labor force and means that the Chinese economic structure is undergoing some kinds of changes now,” said Shen Dayong.
Many experts said unanimously that some problems in China, such as unbalanced development, deteriorating environment and an increasing income gap, have not resulted from joining the WTO and cannot be solved by the WTO. These problems were due to the errors and incomplete consideration of China during its development and nobody can deny the significant achievements arising from China joining the WTO.
Shanghai could serve as a good example for the development of China after joining the WTO. It is widely believed that the first ten years after joining the WTO have been the best period for the development of Shanghai. In 2001, Shanghai took the lead in launching reforms in foreign trade management rights and removing the limits on the qualification of foreign trade enterprises. Since then on, a lot of private companies have been allowed to take part in foreign trade, which has promoted the development of Shanghai as an international city. According to Gu Jiahe, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce, it is now an important period for the reform and adjustment of the global economic situation. The global economy is recovering from the financial crisis at a low speed, along with increasing international competition and rising trade protectionism. With the strengthening economic power of China, other members of the WTO have more and more demands for China. The developed countries are asking China to be more open; the developing countries are to consider China as both an important partner and rival for their development and the least developed countries are to consider China as a developed country and require more favors from their trade.
In Gu Jiahe’s opinion, the function of multilateral trade has been weakened in the past ten years and regional cooperation is playing a more important role. That weakened the function of the WTO in the world. The Doha Round Talks, which aimed at solving trade problems, were originally to be finished in 2005 but were delayed till the end of 2011 due to disputes among members. In addition, the WTO did not have a positive role in fighting against trade protectionism. With the rise of regional economic cooperation and the economic and trade groups in different kinds of forms, the agglomeration power of multilateral trade system is weakened and the WTO is left out in the cold.
“Guess of 2016” for China’s Economy
This April, the IMF published a report called the World Economic Outlook, pointing out that the GDP of China will increase from 11.2 trillion U.S. dollars in 2011 to 19 trillion U.S. dollars in 2016 while the U.S. GDP will rise to 18.8 trillion U.S. dollars by then. This means that China will become the largest economy in the world by 2016. Therefore, the IMF calls the year of 2016 the “Year of China”.
The above forecast contains an important assumption that the Chinese economic growth rate will be maintained at the same level. If China indeed encounters slowed or even stagnant economic growth like Japan has suffered from since 1990, the gap between China and the U.S.A cannot be reduced or might be enlarged. “From 2016 to 2019, there will be no more labor force in the rural areas of China that can be recruited into the second and third indus- tries. In addition, the cheap labor force in India and other countries will be involved in the international labor division and thus cut the China’s advantages built upon the low-cost labor force,”said Zhang Yansheng, a fellow of the Foreign Trade Institute of the National Development and Reform Commission. In addition, when the market economy is fully recognized in China in 2016, foreign companies will no longer be able to take anti-dumping measures against Chinese commodities as easily as they are doing now. However, the enthusiasm of foreign investors in China might not be as high as today. Zhang Yansheng said that foreign investments are more and more centralized in the real estate, urban construction and large facilities sectors. The proportion of investment in manufacturing is becoming smaller and smaller. In addition, foreign investors are showing more and more enthusiasm in domestic demand instead of exports. Thus, the amount of foreign investment from tax-free areas and free ports is increasing while investment from Europe, America and Japan is decreasing. When all these trends have developed to a certain level, the role of foreign investment might be changed.
Compared with ten years ago, the Chinese economy is more complex and uncertain, with more challenges and opportunities. Experts believe that China has lowered its tariffs for years, not only for joining the WTO, but also for its own agenda of reform and opening up, as well as the involvement in economic globalization. Regardless of whether China had joined the WTO or not, it would have held onto its policies of reform and opening up. In the future, Chinese enterprises will face more stress. They will need to follow international trends and improve their skills of operation, ideas of management and efficiency of business to deal with competition in the future.
On November 15, 1999, China and the U.S.A signed the bilateral agreement. On May 18, 2000, China reached an agreement with the European Union. These two agreements eradicated the largest obstacle for China in joining the WTO. In 2001, Shi Guangsheng, then the Minister for Foreign Trade in China, signed the agreement on China’s joining the WTO. From submitting the application on July 10, 1986, to finally joining the WTO, China went through 15 years of negotiations and meetings. Zhu Rongji, former Chinese premier, once said that he and his contemporaries would see their hair turn grey before hearing of China joining the WTO.
More Challenges than Opportunities
Most people do not understand the difficulties and unease during the negotiations of the WTO. When recalling the current situation, Zhang Xiangchen, director of the research office of China’s Ministry of Commerce, said:“The biggest difficulty at that time was whether joining the WTO would bring us benefits or harm. Some of us worried that the auto industry and tariff in China would be affected after joining this organization. Fortunately, 10 years have past and our worries never became a reality.”
In order to make more precise judgments, Zhang Xiangchen and his colleagues spent a lot of time and energy on analysis and forecasting and proved that joining the WTO was a correct move for China. This reassured people present at the negotiation. However, as Zhang Xiangchen said, the correct move did not mean that there were no problems. For example, there were disputes over reducing or completely removing tariffs for some products. The result proved that it would be unimaginable if the tariffs for some products were completely removed.
It is not an exaggeration to say that China went through complete changes after joining the WTO; the country began to improve in all respects and began to be integrated into the world; its strength went up and the reform deepened; it has become more international- ized and the Chinese government and enterprises have passed the test.
It is worthwhile to mention that China has developed from the 9th largest economy to the 2nd largest economy in the past ten years. According to data from the World Bank, the economic growth rate of China exceeded 10% in 2010 and accounted for 25% of global economic growth. Thus, China has been the engine of global economic growth for two straight years. Wang Xinkui, president of Shanghai WTO Affairs Consultation Center, is a good witness of the changes in China in the past ten years after joining the WTO. He recalled that the whole country was cheered up by the news that China had joined the WTO in 2001.“In the first ten years after joining the WTO, China faced more opportunities than challenges. Then, in the next ten years, China had to face more challenges than opportunities,” said Wang Xinkui. He thought that the Chinese economy still had a lot of uncertainties due to its fast development. For example, China took the place of Japan as the second largest economy in the world in 2010, but China was far behind Japan in its number of multinationals and global brands.
An example Wang Xinkui listed was that China was the champion in export capacity, with Germany in the second place. But if we check the export volumes of these two countries carefully, we will find that the value of commodities exported from Germany is much higher than the ones from China. Wang Xinkui said that the data sometimes could be deceptive and Chinese people should not be blinded by some glorious data. “We need a clear mind to make a correct judgment of our role in the world and the global economic situation before making the right decision. It is worthwhile to mention that China should not neglect the development of multinationals after going through 20 years of fast economic development and globalization, which created the current economic and trade situation dominated by global enterprises. Reports from different institutions showed that multinationals were still the most active elements in the global financial economy. In China, ZTE and Huawei are typical representatives of Chinese multinationals that experienced development after China joined the WTO. However, there are quite few companies like these two in China.
Actually, “joining the WTO” meant the “arrival of wolves” for many Chinese before 2001. At that time, many Chinese domestic enterprises thought foreign companies could cross the lowered tariff and trade barrier and directly compete with them. But the result proved that there was a two-way influence. On the one hand, “joining the WTO” opened up quite a large number of industries to foreign companies and brought great stress for the Chinese
companies. On the other hand, Chinese companies have gained a lot of precious experiences from the competition with foreign companies and thus grew up.
Concepts of WTO Widely Accepted In China, almost every person knows what the WTO is, showing that the concepts of this organization have been widely acknowledged.
“In the past ten years after joining the WTO, China became a beneficiary of economic globalization,” said Shen Dayong, deputy director of the International Economy and Trade Institute at the Shanghai Institute of Foreign Trade. In his opinion, the economic development China gained from joining the WTO is much more than expected. It also accelerated the systematic reform and the change of government functions in China. For example, the government learnt to open and clarify the political affairs and financial system after joining the WTO. These changes have been silently incorporated into the lives of ordinary people. The most obvious change is the balance between rights and obligations, which gradually changed the way of thinking.
However, Shen Dayong also worried about a series of changes that had happened in the past ten years. Presently the U.S.A, Europe and Japan are all going through slow economic development. China, as one of the emerging economies, is co-existing and competing with Brazil, India, South Africa and other developing countries. The cheap labor force, which was a forceful weapon of China in the past ten years, is no longer to the advantage of Chinese enterprises. Another problem is quite haunting as well. Presently the income of Chinese people is not in tune with the economic development of China. “For example, a girl who graduates from university cannot find a job. But her mother, a 50-year- old lady, could easily find a job as a babysitter or hourly employee and her salary could be between 3000 and 4000 yuan per month, the same as a white collar’s monthly salary. This is a typical case for the increasing cost of simple labor force and means that the Chinese economic structure is undergoing some kinds of changes now,” said Shen Dayong.
Many experts said unanimously that some problems in China, such as unbalanced development, deteriorating environment and an increasing income gap, have not resulted from joining the WTO and cannot be solved by the WTO. These problems were due to the errors and incomplete consideration of China during its development and nobody can deny the significant achievements arising from China joining the WTO.
Shanghai could serve as a good example for the development of China after joining the WTO. It is widely believed that the first ten years after joining the WTO have been the best period for the development of Shanghai. In 2001, Shanghai took the lead in launching reforms in foreign trade management rights and removing the limits on the qualification of foreign trade enterprises. Since then on, a lot of private companies have been allowed to take part in foreign trade, which has promoted the development of Shanghai as an international city. According to Gu Jiahe, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce, it is now an important period for the reform and adjustment of the global economic situation. The global economy is recovering from the financial crisis at a low speed, along with increasing international competition and rising trade protectionism. With the strengthening economic power of China, other members of the WTO have more and more demands for China. The developed countries are asking China to be more open; the developing countries are to consider China as both an important partner and rival for their development and the least developed countries are to consider China as a developed country and require more favors from their trade.
In Gu Jiahe’s opinion, the function of multilateral trade has been weakened in the past ten years and regional cooperation is playing a more important role. That weakened the function of the WTO in the world. The Doha Round Talks, which aimed at solving trade problems, were originally to be finished in 2005 but were delayed till the end of 2011 due to disputes among members. In addition, the WTO did not have a positive role in fighting against trade protectionism. With the rise of regional economic cooperation and the economic and trade groups in different kinds of forms, the agglomeration power of multilateral trade system is weakened and the WTO is left out in the cold.
“Guess of 2016” for China’s Economy
This April, the IMF published a report called the World Economic Outlook, pointing out that the GDP of China will increase from 11.2 trillion U.S. dollars in 2011 to 19 trillion U.S. dollars in 2016 while the U.S. GDP will rise to 18.8 trillion U.S. dollars by then. This means that China will become the largest economy in the world by 2016. Therefore, the IMF calls the year of 2016 the “Year of China”.
The above forecast contains an important assumption that the Chinese economic growth rate will be maintained at the same level. If China indeed encounters slowed or even stagnant economic growth like Japan has suffered from since 1990, the gap between China and the U.S.A cannot be reduced or might be enlarged. “From 2016 to 2019, there will be no more labor force in the rural areas of China that can be recruited into the second and third indus- tries. In addition, the cheap labor force in India and other countries will be involved in the international labor division and thus cut the China’s advantages built upon the low-cost labor force,”said Zhang Yansheng, a fellow of the Foreign Trade Institute of the National Development and Reform Commission. In addition, when the market economy is fully recognized in China in 2016, foreign companies will no longer be able to take anti-dumping measures against Chinese commodities as easily as they are doing now. However, the enthusiasm of foreign investors in China might not be as high as today. Zhang Yansheng said that foreign investments are more and more centralized in the real estate, urban construction and large facilities sectors. The proportion of investment in manufacturing is becoming smaller and smaller. In addition, foreign investors are showing more and more enthusiasm in domestic demand instead of exports. Thus, the amount of foreign investment from tax-free areas and free ports is increasing while investment from Europe, America and Japan is decreasing. When all these trends have developed to a certain level, the role of foreign investment might be changed.
Compared with ten years ago, the Chinese economy is more complex and uncertain, with more challenges and opportunities. Experts believe that China has lowered its tariffs for years, not only for joining the WTO, but also for its own agenda of reform and opening up, as well as the involvement in economic globalization. Regardless of whether China had joined the WTO or not, it would have held onto its policies of reform and opening up. In the future, Chinese enterprises will face more stress. They will need to follow international trends and improve their skills of operation, ideas of management and efficiency of business to deal with competition in the future.