Wen vows continued opening-up decade after entry of WTO
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Xinhua, October 14, 2011
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Friday that China will deepen opening-up after it entered the World Trade Organization (WTO) a decade ago so as to bring benefits to its people and the world.
Wen made the remarks at the opening ceremony of the 110 Canton Fair in Guangzhou, capital of south China's Guangzhou Province.
Wen said China's accession to the WTO has had "huge and far-reaching impact" on China as the country's economy received a great boost for development and its overall competitiveness improved.
China rose from the 6th to the second place in th world in terms of trade volume, with export ranking the first, Wen said.
Meanwhile, foreign direct investment (FDI) over the past 10 years totaled 759.5 billion U.S. dollars, the highest among developing countries, according to Wen.
"China's WTO accession has also brought tangible benefits to many countries around the world," Wen told the Forum on the 10th Anniversary of China's Accession to the WTO on the sideline of the Canton Fair.
During the decade, China imported 750 billion dollars worth of goods each year on average and created more than 14 million jobs for its trading partners, Wen said.
In the meantime, Chinese enterprises operating overseas employed nearly 800,000 people locally and paid over 10 billion dollars in taxes every year, according to Wen.
"During the decade, thanks to imported goods from China, American consumers saved more than 600 billion dollars in spending. Every family in the EU saved up 300 euros every year by the same token," Wen told the forum.
"Facts have shown that a more open China has benefited not only the 1.3 billion people of China, but also the people around the world," Wen said.
"A WTO family with China on board is a success story for both China and the world," he added.
Wen however noted that the world economic recovery from the financial crisis was shadowed by various factors such as the bogged-down Doha Round negotiations, the rising trade and investment protectionism, and the tendency of politicizing trade frictions.
He thus called upon all nations to open their markets wider, reject protectionism of all forms and find solutions to trade frictions to break the spell of the global financial crisis and achieve strong, sustainable and balanced growth of the world economy.
The Canton Fair, or the China Import and Export Fair, is China's largest trade fair and a key barometer to the country's trade and economic development.
The biannual fair was first held in 1957.
