China's first negative list for cross-border service trade, the Hainan Free Trade Port's Special Administrative Measures for cross-border service trade (Negative List) (2021 edition), was officially released on July 26. It clearly lists 70 special administrative measures in 11 categories for overseas service providers.

According to introducing, "listing" unified lists the national treatment, market access, local presence, financial services, the respect such as cross-border trade to foreign service providers to provide services in cross-border way (via cross-border delivery, consumption abroad, natural person movement mode) of the special management measures, for the free trade port, hainan province region of hainan island.

"In all areas outside the list, hainan free trade Port will treat domestic and foreign service providers as equals and have equal access to cross-border service trade, and its openness, transparency and predictability will be greatly improved." Vice commerce minister and deputy representatives Wang Shouwen international trade negotiations in the scio, said at the conference that the management mode of trade in services "listing" is a major breakthrough, is an open type system arrangement, help to promote service trade liberalization, enhance the level of overall opening in China, will be a good service to build the new development pattern.

The south China sea institute of free trade port in hainan Cai Zhenwei deputy director of the research center in China trade news reporter interview, said the "listing" deep cuts in the service trade in the field of access restrictions, helps to attract international high quality resources, elements and capital into the service sector, enhance the international competitiveness of service trade in our country.

How open is the "first order" of the negative list for cross-border services trade? Wang said the level of openness in the list exceeds China's WTO accession commitments and is higher than the level of openness in the corresponding areas of major free trade agreements already in force.

Wang said that the WTO has classified the service sector into 160 sub-sectors. Among the 100 sub-sectors that China promised to open when it joined wto, more than 70 sub-sectors in the LIST are more open than promised at that time. For example, in the legal services sub-sector, China's legal services are not included in the WTO commitments, and foreign service providers are not allowed to provide Chinese legal services. The List clearly states that the representative offices of foreign law firms in Hainan can engage in some commercial and non-litigation legal affairs involving Hainan.

The list will undoubtedly inject new impetus into the construction of hainan free trade Port. Wang shouwen said that the liberalization and facilitation of service trade is the basic feature of the international high-level free trade port. The implementation of the negative list for cross-border service trade in Hainan will promote the free and convenient flow of production factors and resources such as technology, capital and data with services as the carrier, which is very important for promoting the construction of a high-level free trade port with strong international influence.

Chen Xi, director of the Commerce Department of Hainan Province, said that the list, together with other existing free trade port policies, can form a superposition effect and promote hainan Free trade port to form new advantages in the development of service trade, which will have a positive role in promoting the development of industries and enterprises.

Lin Yongxin, director of the Maritime Silk Road Research Institute of the China South China Sea Research Institute, told reporters that services are carriers, and the key is to promote the free and convenient flow of production factors such as technology and data. The implementation of the List will help promote the liberalization of service trade and enhance the overall opening level of Hainan free trade port.

CAI Zhenwei said that as the free trade port is the highest level of opening-up in the world, the implementation of the List will promote hainan Free trade Port to become a new plateau of China's opening up. According to hainan's 14th Five-Year Plan, the added value of the service sector will account for more than 65% of the total value by 2025. The implementation of the List will help remove the existing barriers in service trade, greatly improve trade and investment facilitation, and boost the development of hainan's tourism, modern service industry, finance, medical and other industries.

Experts said that the implementation of the List at hainan free Trade Port will not only promote the open development of Hainan's service industry, but also help improve the opening level of China's service industry, and by introducing high-level service providers from abroad to participate in domestic competition, it can improve the efficiency of domestic big circulation.

The service sector is the leading industry in Hainan, accounting for more than 60% of the province's GDP. According to the latest statistics, the service sector contributes 95.8% to Hainan's economic growth. Cai Zhenwei said, modern service industry is the overall concept of free trade port in hainan province established one of the three leading industries, to promote the development of service trade, hainan in cross-border delivery, international practice, talent introduction and digital services export, Internet access, and other fields has made a series of results, with the accelerating of free trade port construction and the implementation of the "listing", Cross-border service trade will usher in a new round of rapid development.

It is understood that in the fields of modern services and commercial services, the List has made arrangements for further opening up. For example, the List has cancelled the restrictions on the establishment of ship survey companies. Foreign ship survey institutions now do not need to set up a ship survey company with independent legal personality in Hainan free trade Port, and can directly send personnel or employees to carry out ship survey business in Hainan. This also improves the free and convenient level of transportation, which is conducive to the shipping enterprises of Hainan Free Trade Port to obtain more and better international services. At the same time, it can also reduce operating costs and provide new convenient conditions for the agglomeration and development of international shipping enterprises.

"The List will help Hainan make full use of international factors of production and optimize the allocation level of factors. "The list will promote the development of industries related to service trade with openness, substantially promote Hainan's internationalization level in industries and modern service industries, and help hainan cultivate new industrial forms." According to Lin yongxin, trade in services, especially the integration of digital economy to promote trade in services, is the main track that hainan free Trade Port should focus on and make efforts to build. Hainan has the policy advantages of developing service trade (free trade port policy, negative list of service trade), the advantages of independent geographical unit and controllable stress test risk, and the advantages of connecting the super-large domestic market and southeast Asian market. The development prospect of cross-border service trade of Hainan Free trade Port is promising.