policy

On 26 October, China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM), the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) and the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) jointly released a plan for e-commerce development during the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) The scale and penetration rate of e-commerce in China is already astonishing, and this plan aims to push it to new heights. According to the plan, the volume of e-commerce transactions in China reached RMB …

Although a Maoist term, Xi Jinping’s ‘common prosperity’ has little in common with radical egalitarianism. The concrete policy proposals that we have seen to date — like those in Zhejiang’s Common Prosperity Polit Area — are relatively modest and below the standards of many modern welfare states, writes Torsten Weller China’s dramatic crackdown on the country’s tech firms is turning into a broader reform of the welfare system and a …

Hainan has become the first province to publish a Negative List for Cross-Border Trade in Services. While the list is far longer than the nationwide list for foreign investment, it is much more detailed and provides a useful template for further reform, writes Torsten Weller While China’s regulatory crackdown and the focus on ‘Common Prosperity’ dominated this summer’s headlines, a smaller but nonetheless significant development took place on the island …

Kristina Koehler-Coluccia from Woodburn Accountants & Advisors examines how changes to the Individual Income Tax Law (IIT) will affect earnings for foreign professionals living and working in China  A series of expatriate allowances and tax exemptions that had long been aimed at attracting foreign talent to China will no longer be valid starting 1 January 2022. This will directly impact the taxable income of foreigners working in the region. According …

Private tutoring is just the latest target in a long list of industry crackdowns in China. The change in policy is already having a profound effect on international education operations in China, and possibly on the future flow of students into education institutions abroad, writes Tim van Gardingen In mid-2021, the Chinese government put forward the ‘shuangjian’, or ‘double reduction’ policy. The policy aims to reduce the intense stress levels …

While global economies have been battered by rolling lockdowns throughout the pandemic, the Chinese economy has proven remarkably resilient, expanding by 12.5% in the first half of 2021. As the UK’s third-largest goods trading partner and sixth-largest buyer of British goods exports in 2020, the Chinese market presents an enormous opportunity for UK companies looking to diversify their international business activities, whether this be via cross border e-commerce, establishing operations …

China’s Anti-Foreign Sanctions Law provides a stronger legal basis to the sanctions China has administered to date. However, as Joe Cash writes, this is not necessarily a cause for alarm, as companies should remember that ‘blocking statutes’ are pieces of legislation that all sophisticated actors in international trade have, but few use On 10 June, the Standing Committee of China’s National People’s Congress approved a sweeping law designed to counter …

The new decision marks a significant shift in China’s family planning policy, but it remains to be seen whether young couples will take advantage of it At a meeting of the Politburo of the CPC Central Committee on Monday, 31 May 2020, it was announced that China will now allow couples to have a third child. This follows an earlier move in 2016 that allowed couples to have two children. …

The UK’s Integrated Review mirrors many of the top priorities of China’s 14th Five-Year Plan, including cooperation in R&D and green development and more investment in these areas. The UK government published its long-awaited Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy on 16 March. The nearly 100-page long document, titled ‘Global Britain in a Competitive Age,’ outlines the government’s foreign policy strategy for the next five years as …

Gordon Orr is a non-executive board member of Meituan, Swire Pacific, Lenovo, EQT and the China-Britain Business Council. He is a senior advisor to McKinsey on China related topics and was responsible for establishing McKinsey’s China practice in the 1990s. Here, he provides his insights as to what might be in store for China in 2021 China enters 2021 economically stronger relative to major economies than anytime since 2009. This …