WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION   
G/C/W/661 
4 November 2011 
 (11-5634) 
Council for Trade in Goods Original:   English 
  
 
TRANSITIONAL REVIEW MECHANISM PURSUANT TO PARAGRAPH 18 OF THE 
PROTOCOL ON THE ACCESSION OF THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA 
 
Information provided by China on Annex 1A of the Protocol 
on Accession of the People's Republic of China 
  
The following communication, dated 3 November 2011, is being circulated at the request of 
the delegation of China. 
 
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II. ECONOMIC POLICIES 
 
1. Non-Discrimination 
 
(a) The repeal and cessation of all WTO inconsiste nt laws, regulations and other measures on 
national treatment. 
Since its accession into the WTO, China has el iminated all the provisions that once were 
considered to be inconsistent with the national tr eatment principle, especi ally those discussed in 
the accession negotiations, in th e process of formulating, amen ding and repealing trade-related 
laws, regulations, rules and administrative measur es.  The national treatment principle has been 
well manifested in the legislation of China relating to trade.  In this respect, China has also maintained candid communication with other WTO Members.  Since the last transitional review 
in 2009, the Interim Measures on Administration of th e Special Fund for Industrialization of 
Wind Power Generation Equipment (Ministry of Finance Circular Cai Jian [2008] No. 476), 
on which some WTO Members had been express ing their concerns, was repealed in the 
Ministry of Finance Decree No. 62 issued on 21 February 2011. 
 
(b) The repeal or modification to provide full GATT national treatment in respect of laws, 
regulations and other measures applying to internal sale, offering for sale, purchase, transportation, distribution or use of:  after sale service, pharmaceutical products, cigarettes, 
spirits, chemicals and boiler and pressure v essels (for pharmaceutical products, chemicals and 
spirits there is a reservation of the right to use a transitional period of one year from the date 
of accession in order to amend or repeal relevant legislation).   
The information on the modifications to the ad ministrative measures in respect of after sale 
service, pharmaceutical products, cigarettes, chemicals and boiler and pressure vessels with the aim to providing full GATT national treat ment has been provided in the Annex 1A 
information that China has previously subm itted to the WTO Council for Trade in Goods.  
 G/C/W/661 
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  IV. POLICIES AFFECTING TRADE IN GOODS 
 5. Export Restrictions 
 
(a)  Any restrictions on exports through non-au tomatic licensing or other means justified by 
specific product under the WTO Agreement or the Protocol  
  
The information on export administration that Chin a provides here is for transparency purpose 
only and shall not be deemed as to mean that the measures covered necessarily fall within the 
scope of export restriction as defined in the WTO.  
 
China maintains export administration of a small number of products for the purposes of protecting public interest, conserving exhaustible  natural resources, or undertaking obligations 
under international treaties, and etc.  This is  in conformity with Article XX of GATT1994. 
 
In respect of non-tariff measures, in 2010 and 2011, products subject to export license and 
export quota license in China include maize, ri ce, wheat, maize flours, wheat flours, rice 
flours, cotton, sawn timber, live cattle, live swin e, live fowl, frozen and fresh beef, frozen and 
fresh pork, frozen and fresh chicken, coal, coke , crude oil, processed oil, rare earth, antimony 
and its products, tungsten a nd its products, indium and its products, molybdenum and 
molybdenum products, zinc ore, tin and its products, silver, rushes and rushes products, 
silicon carbide, talc lump (powder), light (d ead) burned magnesium, bauxite, phosphate ore, 
liquorice and its products, substances depl eting ozonosphere, para ffin wax, platinum 
(exported through processing trade), zinc and zinc alloy, part of rare metals, automobiles 
(including CKD) and chassis, motorcycles (inc luding all terrain motorcycles) and their 
engines and frames, part of steel products, and natural sands.  Products prohibited from 
exporting include tiger bone, rhino horn, musk, b ezoar, certain chemicals used in production 
of narcotics, certain substances depleting ozo nosphere, log, charcoal, platinum, silica sand 
and quartz sand. 
 
For non-tariff export administration measur es implemented by China in 2008 and 2009, 
please refer to the quantitative restriction notif ications submitted by China to the Committee 
on Market Access in accordance with the G/L/ 59 requirement. For quantitative restriction 
notifications of 2010, 2011 and in future, th e China is now studying adjustments to be made 
in accordance with the new notification format  which is under discussion in the Committee on 
Market Access. China will as always continue to  fulfil the transparency obligation in this 
regard. 
 
In respect of tariff measures, China maintain ed interim export tariffs on 301 products with  
8-digit HS headings in 2010, and on 312 products with 8-digit HS headings in 2011. 
 
9. State Trading Entities  
 (a) Progressive abolishment of state trading in respect of silk measures, increasing and extending 
trading rights, granting the right to trade to all individuals no later than 1 January 2005. 
 
Information on abolishment of state trading in respect of silk measures and liberalization of 
trading rights no later than 1 January 2005 was su bmitted to Council for Trade in Goods in the 
Annex 1A information of 2004.  Since then, there have been no changes. 
 (b) Access to supplies of raw materials in the te xtiles sector at conditions no less favourable than 
for domestic users, and not adversely affected access to supplies of raw materials as enjoyed 
under existing arrangements.  G/C/W/661 
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Conditions for access to supplies of raw materials in textile sector for foreign users remain the 
same as for domestic users, and have not been adversely affected. 
 (c) Progressive increases in access by non-state trad ing entities to trade in fertilizer and oil and 
the filling of quantities available for import by non-state trading entities  
 
Compared with the situation at the time of China's accession, there has been a substantial 
increase in the number of non-state-trading ente rprises for importation of crude oil, processed 
oil and fertilizers.  On 19 September 2010 and 10 October 2011, Ministry of Commerce 
(MOFCOM) issued Public Announcements No. 57 of 2010 and No. 66 of 2011 and 
promulgated procedures to be followed and c onditions to be met by non-state-trading 
enterprises when applying for importation of processed oil.  On 30 December 2009 and 28 
December 2010, MOFCOM issued Public Announcements No. 133 of 2009 and No. 103 of 2010 and published the results of allocation of im port tariff rate quotas for fertilizers in the 
two years, which included also lists of non-st ate-trading enterprises that had newly obtained 
the qualification for importation of fertilizers. 
 
The volumes permitted for importation of crude  oil in 2010 and 2011 by non-state-trading 
enterprise were 25.3 million tons and 29.1 million tons respectively, and the volumes 
permitted for importation of processed oil in 2 010 and 2011 by non-state-trading enterprise 
were 14.09 million tons and 16. 2 million tons respectively. 
 The year of 2006 was the end year of the co mmitted increase in tariff rate quota (TRQ) 
quantity for chemical fertilizer imports by non-state-trading enterprises.  Compared with 2006, there are no changes with the import tariff rate quotas for fertilizers for non-state-
trading enterprises in 2010 and 2011. 
 From 2003 to 2011, the volumes permitted for im portation of crude oil, processed oil and 
chemical fertilizers by non-state-trading enterp rises were fully allocated.  However, as holders 
of the volumes permitted for importation by non- state-trading enterprises may also consign 
state-trading enterprises to import, it is technically  not feasible at this st age for the Customs to 
have statistics of the imports of the non-state-trading enterprises. 
 
10. Government Procurement 
 
(a) Laws, regulations and procedures 
 
On government procurement, China has in itiated negotiations on  accession into the 
Government Procurement Agreement (GPA) .  The application for accession into the GPA and 
Appendix I offer were submitte d on 28 December 2007.  In September 2008, China submitted 
Replies to the Checklist of Issues for Provisi on of Information Relating to Accession to the 
GPA.  In July 2010, China submitted a revised offer. China has also received requests from 
GPA participating Members. 
 
The major law regarding government  procurement in China is the Law of the People's 
Republic of China on Government Procurement  which took effect on 1 January 2003.  A 
legislative framework on government procurement has been basically put in place, with the 
Law of the People's Republic of  China on Government Procurement  as the foundation and a 
series of departmental rules as supplements.  The system embodies such basic principles as 
openness and transparency, fair competition and good value. 
 (b) Procurement in a transparent manner and application of the MFN principle  G/C/W/661 
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To ensure transparency in government procur ement, information on laws, regulations and 
administrative measures relating to government  procurement, procurement opportunities, 
results of the contract award and advance ex amination on qualification of suppliers etc. 
should all be published at the  designated  government procurement website of China 
(http://www.ccgp.gov.cn ), as well as such media as China Government Procurement News , 
China State Finance magazine and  China Government Procurement magazine.  All foreign-
invested enterprises registered in  China are entitled to national treatment, and all the products 
produced in China by foreign-invested enterp rises and/or domestic enterprises are treated 
equally and indiscriminatingly in China's government procurement. 
 
 
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