China’s reform and opening-up policy – Canadian perspective

China has been a second home to me after Canada and it’s been a focus of my curiosity due to its rich ancient civilization and cultural values. Recently, there have been many stories and articles about the second-largest economy after the US. Certainly, it’s a great achievement and if we get retrospective, the footsteps seemed to be rooted back in 1978. The current development is an output of China’s reform and opening-up policy executed by visionary and erudite Deng Xiaoping. This article aims to highlight all the salient factors, facts and figures related to Chinese economy and its impact on the world.

China and Canada have signed number of trade agreements under China’s reform and opening-up policy. Based on the statistics from the General Administration of Customs of the People’s Republic of China, the volume of bilateral trade between China and Canada reached $34.52 billion in 2008, an increase of 13.8 percent over the year. Canada’s exports to China touched $12.73 billion, a 16 percent rise over 2007, while Canada’s imports from China surged to $21.79 billion, a 12.6 percent increase over 2007.

Likewise, China has increased its investment in Canada. In 2008, China had $950 million of non-financial direct investment in Canada. At the end of 2008, China’s total non-financial direct investment in such Canadian sectors as industrial production, agriculture, construction, fishing and farming, food and beverage, scientific research, cultural communications, traffic and transportation, and consulting service was $3.84 billion. In 2008, China allowed 410 extra investment projects in Canada. In the same period, Canada invested $540 million in China. By the end of 2008, Canada had invested in 10,891 projects in China, with the amount of completed investment reaching $6.37 billion. The pie chart above shows continuous increase in trade volume between the two countries.

Due to Canada’s wider policy to diminish trade dependence on the United States, there has been a transformed interest in firming Canada’s trade relationship with China. The two countries share an enduring bilateral relationship across numerous significant areas including governance, trade, education and energy.

At present, China is Canada’s third-largest trading partner, with trade volume between the two countries estimated at $85.9 billion in 2015. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wants to double the trade between the two nations before 2025 and some significant steps have been taken to achieve that target. In February 2017, an opening round of dialogues on a free trade agreement between Canada and China took place.

Canada has been looking toward enhancing trade volume with China over the past few years. In 2014, Canada and China signed a Foreign Investment Protection Act (FIPA), which offers both material and representational backing for cordial bilateral relationships. This covenant targets to safeguard Canadian investors in China, also the Chinese investors in Canada, safeguard against biased treatment, in addition to smoothing extensive term market prospects across a range of sectors.

The China-Canada FIPA sets the base for a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the two nations. It is proposed that this FTA would boost Canadian exports to China by almost $7.7 billion which might result in increasing Canadian GDP by about $7.8 billion (or 0.14 percent) by 2030. This would generate around 25,000 Canadian jobs across all skill levels.

At the end, China’s reform and opening-up policy not only benefits the Chinese nation but also the Canadians.

Zarrin Gull, an explorer from Milton Canada, who likes to know about different cultures and  writing about them.

The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not represent the views of China Daily and China Daily website.