Beijing aims to come up with a set of guiding principles for global investment when it hosts the G20 summit in Hangzhou in September.
Foreign Minister Wang Yi announced the goal on Thursday as he laid out the agenda for the summit.
Analysts said the goal was part of Beijing’s efforts to position itself as a major international player reshaping rules in global trade and investment despite being excluded from deals such as the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership.
With 100 days to go until the summit, Wang said Beijing’s other goals for the gathering included stepping up joint efforts against corruption and deepening reform of the International Monetary Fund.
He said China would promote a three-pronged approach to tackling corruption: establishing guidelines for pursuing high-level fugitives, setting up a research centre on fugitives and stolen assets, and drawing up a 2017-2018 anti-corruption “action plan”.
Wang also said China aimed to help transform the “G20 from a crisis-handling mechanism to one that lead the world’s economic growth and international economic cooperation in the long term”.
Wang said there were roughly 3,200 bilateral agreements on international investment and China would push for the G20 to define guiding principles for a global investment policy of its own.
“This would be the world’s first multilateral investment framework,” Wang said.
He did not say what the principles would be, but Xiong Aizong, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said they would compliment the existing order and be a consensus.
Chu Yin, an associate professor with the University of International Relations, said the announcement reflected China’s desire to play a bigger role on the world stage.
“The US has formulated the TPP for Asia and is also in discussion on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership with the European Union. China needs to express its own voice and reinforce the role of the World Trade Organisation on the platform of the G20,” Chu said.
But he said he was not optimistic of realising the goal anytime soon. “It’s China’s position, but in the short-term it will remain an idea,” Chu said.
Wang said it was important to get the ball rolling on the process.
“Multilateral investment rules will not be realised at a stroke, but starting the process is significant in its own right,” he said.
South China Morning Post
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