CHINA will focus on freeing up foreign investment in banking, insurance, securities and futures market trading firms as part of a wider opening up of the services sector, the country’s top economic planner said in a document released Friday.

    Current rules limit foreign investors in China’s securities industry to 49 percent stakes in joint ventures set up with local partners.

    Earlier last week, Premier Li Keqiang vowed steps to attract foreign investment in manufacturing and “create fair competition conditions for foreign and domestic firms.”

    In manufacturing, restrictions will be eased in transportation equipment, motor bikes, ethanol and edible fats and oils, said the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country’s highest economic planning agency. China will also lower curbs on foreign investment in unconventional oil and gas production, including shale gas.

    Foreign capital will be allowed in accounting, architecture design, auditing and rating services, according to the NDRC, which also said it will push for the “orderly opening up” of the telecom, Internet, cultural, education and transportation sectors.

    Foreign investors will be allowed to participate through franchise agreements in infrastructure projects in fields including energy, transportation, environmental protection and water conservation, said Ning Jizhe, vice chairman of the NDRC.

    Some of the pledges echoed changes in a draft of foreign investment guidelines released earlier last month, which reduced the number of restricted or closed sectors to 62 from 93.

    The foreign investment opening comes as China tightens capital controls, fighting outflows as the yuan slides to its lowest level against the dollar in more than eight years. Defending the yuan has eaten into China’s foreign exchange reserves, which shrank to US$3.05 trillion in November, down by about a quarter since June 2014. (SD-Agencies)