China on Thursday unveiled a shortened negative list for foreign investment, with the number of items subject to special administrative measures down from 63 to 48, further reducing the scope of foreign investment approval.

The new negative list released by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the Ministry of Commerce, which will come into effect on July 28, outlines key reforms in the financial sector while removing the equity cap and restrictions in sectors including automobile, agriculture and infrastructure.

As the world’s two largest economies are due to slide deeper into a trade rhetoric on July 6, Washington will start implementing tariffs on 34 billion US dollars worth of Chinese imports. Beijing has vowed to retaliate in kind but stressed that it would not levy tariffs ahead of the US doing so.

US president Donald Trump repeatedly stated that China has been taking out 500 billion UD dollars a year from the US, singling out China as the villain in the worsening trade dispute. The trade numbers, however, are grossly inaccurate. Charles Liu, the founder of Hao Capital, pointed out that the trade figures are based on invalid methods of calculation, and the ungrounded long-standing complaints are misleading, which has the potential to create ill in the global economic governance.

“The Trump administration complained that China takes 500 billion US dollars annually in terms of exports to the US.“

“The calculating method is incorrect -the services are not included, and what’s left in China for manufacturing an Apple Iphone is only 7% of its total cost, as the components come from all over South East Asia, Japan, Korea and the US. Using a totally invalid system to calculate how much China is stealing from the US is totally absurd.”

“China is still a developing country. I’m of an age where I participated in the Uruguay Round, when countries in Europe were very concerned about how to help developing countries grow instead of bashing them on the head for doing things which we don’t like."

“China is learning a lot of lessons, it has gotten very big so it has to play a different role in the world economy than 30 or 20 years ago.”

Liu added that the white paper and the negative list released recently, however, would serve multiple purposes and cast light on China's past and future role in global economic growth.

"First, it serves as a reminder of where China has come from over the last two decades, Second, it shows the direction of where China is going with its opening-up reforms; Lastly, it shows that China is taking a very hard position on multilateralism and globalism.”

Mats Harborn, President of EU Chamber of Commerce in China, shared his thoughts on China’s efforts to promote greater transparency when dealing with its major trading partners. 

“The most important way forward is for China to be very much transparent about its plans to address those concerns that have been expressed by other trading partners. There are a number of lessons learnt that will help diffuse tensions and misunderstandings.”

Dialogue with Yang Rui is a 30-minute current affairs talk show on CGTN. It airs daily at 7:30 p.m. BJT (1130GMT), with rebroadcasts at 3:30 a.m. (1930GMT) and 11:30 a.m. (0330GMT).