The General Direction of the Political and Economic Policies

China quickly realized that the opening up to the outside and the development of the country were closely correlated. This is why in the 2000s , the country took steps in order to foster foreign investment.

Since joining the WTO in 2001, China has established measures to demonstrate transparency in line with agreements with the WTO.

In order to foster the country's development, China has implemented policies to open their economy to outside investment:

 the law concerning joint ventures with Chinese and foreign companies

 le law concerning Sino-foreign cooperative joint ventures

 the law concerning the foreign-funded enterprises

the goal of these laws is to create an open and fair environment.

2002: Drafting of regulation to focus foreign investments in certain selected sectors.

2004: Revision of the preferred sectors and areas of activity in which they hoped to attract foreign investment; particularly central and western areas. This action was implemented as part of the "go west" policies established by the Chinese authorities in order to foster the central and western part of the country's development.

The aim is to entice foreign businessman to invest in energy sectors, in the manufacturing industry and in the central and western areas.

China has made efforts to improve international cooperation, the exploration and the exploitation of energy resources e.g., oil and natural gas. However oil and natural gas are not the only energy resources concerned. Indeed, unconventional reserves e.g., ores have also been taken into account.

China also invited the foreign countries to invest in energy facilities and to exploit them.

Today, China is aware of the importance of intellectual property. This new state of mind is the opposite of the negative view that China evokes concerning Intellectual Property. Foreign investors quickly realized that their long-term interest was to change China's approach to the Intellectual Property.

International cooperation promoting entrepreneurship, innovations, R&D and knowledge transfers have provided the framework for further evolutions of Intellectual Property policy.

The proof being that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office noted that between 1998 and 2005, the number of granted patents by Chinese Companies nearly doubled*( Nurturing Respect for IP in China, by Georg von Krogh and Stefan Haefliger). This development has resulted in increase of the local companies willingness to strengthen le Intellectual Property rights.

So the presence and the cooperation of foreign companies led to a significant improvement in terms