Global enterprises remain keen on exploring new opportunities and ramping up investments in China, drawn by the nation's inviting policies and commitment to openness.
At the China Development Forum that opened on Sunday, business leaders said that the nation's growing economic potential and opening-up policies encourage international partnerships and sustainable investments.
Bill Winters, CEO of the global bank Standard Chartered, said that the company will continuously focus on supporting both Chinese and foreign enterprises.
"We're prioritizing what we've always prioritized in China, which is to support our Chinese clients who are operating internationally, support international clients who are operating or may want to operate in China," said Winters.
Saleh Al-Khabti, President of ACWA Power China, applauded China's welcoming policies and encouragement for collaboration.
"We will be investing about 75 billion dollars in China between renewable water desalination and green hydrogen. And we are here looking for more partners, more friends in China, to join us in sharing these investments. And hopefully from what we heard today, the government policies, they're very welcoming. They made us feel more comfortable about investing in China," said Al-Khabti.
Jean-Pascal Tricoire, chairman of Schneider Electric, said the company has made remarkable advancements in developing green technology in China.
"In China, we've got 22 net-zero factories. We've got 19 factories which have been certified as green by the Ministry of Information and Industry Technology. So all of this shows that you can apply technology on new factories, new buildings, new data centers, new cities. But more so, you can use -- with a lot of profit -- technology to upgrade existing infrastructure," said Tricoire.
Prominent Chinese business and academic leaders also shared optimism about China's strategic commitment to further opening up its economy.
"I also saw many large enterprises, including the chairman of Rio Tinto Group -- we had exchanges today -- as well as many others. Some we have cooperated with, and some we haven't. Some are my old friends of many years. Some are familiar faces and we meet at different occasions and conferences. I think the further opening of our country is attracting more enterprises to invest in China. In this complex landscape, it is particularly important to demonstrate our resilience and stability," said Liu Yonghao, chairman of New Hope Group.
"China's stance is very firm. We support and encourage further opening up. We encourage sincere cooperation and mutual benefits among countries. So in this regard, we also hope, through policies on further opening up, we could deepen reforms, and attract more multinational companies to operate in China," said Xue Lan, a Cheung Kong Chair Distinguished Professor and Dean of Schwarzman College in Tsinghua University.
Themed "Unleashing Development Momentum for Stable Growth of Global Economy", the two-day forum brought together 86 official delegates from multinational companies from 21 countries.
Global firms keen to explore new opportunities in Chinese market
China will continuously build a robust domestic market to bolster its economy and counter external challenges in accordance with the requirements and arrangement from the annual Central Economic Work Conference, which put domestic demand at the forefront of eight key tasks for next year's economic work, according to experts.
The tone-setting conference was held in Beijing from Wednesday to Thursday in which the Chinese leadership decided priorities for the economic work in 2026.
Over the past four years, domestic demand has contributed an average of 86.4 percent to China's economic growth, according to the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China's top economic planner.
"The top priority is to expand domestic demand as the key reason for this is that our demand is relatively weak. The first step here is figuring out how to increase consumption," said Chen Binkai, vice president of Central University of Finance and Economics.
Consumption has continued to play a leading role in the country's economic growth this year. In the first three quarters, final consumption expenditure contributed 53.5 percent to economic growth, an increase of 9 percentage points compared to the whole of last year.
The annual Central Economic Work Conference proposed that in 2026, a special campaign to boost consumption will be implemented in depth, the supply of high-quality goods and services will be expanded, policies on new and emerging industries will be optimized, unreasonable restrictions in the consumption field will be eliminated, and the potential of service consumption will be unleashed.
"Previously, much of the consumption we have encouraged is for manufactured goods. However, the growth rate of our service sector is not as ideal as that of the manufacturing sector. Therefore, increasing some investment to encourage consumption in the service sector may play a better role in stabilizing growth and expanding domestic demand," said Huang Qunhui, a researcher of the Institute of Economics under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
Experts said that income is the primary factor determining consumption, and only by increasing residents' disposable income, can their consumption capacity be improved.
They also said that the conference, while emphasizing the promotion of consumption, also clearly pointed out the need to formulate and implement a plan to increase the income of urban and rural residents.
"The Third Plenary Session [of the 20th CPC Central Committee] mentioned the need to increase the proportion of residents' income, specifically the proportion of labor compensation within that income. The Fourth Plenary Session [of the 20th CPC Central Committee] further proposed implementing a specific income-increasing plan for urban and rural residents. Of course, consumption is not solely an income issue. We need to strengthen basic public services and improve our social security fund. If these issues are further improved and optimized, and residents have higher incomes, they will be more willing to spend more on consumption, especially on development-oriented consumption," said Huang.
Expanding domestic demand remains top priority for China's economic work in 2026: experts
