Brussels, 15/01/2016 (Agence Europe) - During a meeting in Beijing this week, the negotiators from the European Commission and Chinese government came to an agreement on the scope of the future EU-China bilateral agreement on investment. The talks, which were launched in January, will now continue on the basis of specific texts, the Commission announced on Friday 15 January.
The EU and China have agreed that the possibilities for their investors' market access should be improved in the future by establishing a genuine right to invest and by ensuring that they will not discriminate against their respective companies.
Both parties are also determined to address key challenges of the regulatory environment, including those related to transparency, licensing and authorisation procedures, and to provide for a high and balanced level of protection for investors and their investments.
The future agreement will also include rules on environmental and labour-related dimensions of foreign investment.
“The outcomes of this week set the negotiations on a good track to expect a deal offering a real added value for EU and Chinese firms investing in their respective markets”, the Commission stated, announcing intensive work throughout 2016 in order to define the details of the agreement.
The future EU-China investment agreement aims to replace the 26 bilateral agreements that currently exist between China and the countries of the EU with a single agreement ensuring the legal protection of investments for both parties and guaranteeing reciprocal market access to investors from both sides.
Market access is the EU's hobby horse in these negotiations. It wants to lift restrictions to foreign investment on the Chinese market, as it does the requirements for establishment (joint-ventures and caps on participation), the bans on sectoral investment by means of an “investment catalogue”, the transfer of technology and the requirements for local content (see EUROPE 11406). (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)