SFC Markets and Finance | AmCham Shanghai President: Healthy U.S.-China Trade Benefits Both

南方财经全媒体集团首席记者施诗 记者李依农 上海报道

At the recently concluded 7th China International Import Expo (CIIE), exhibitors from around the world came together to showcase an array of innovative products and services. The event highlighted China’s commitment to openness, its dedication to expanding foreign trade, and its active role in globalization.

In an exclusive interview with SFC, Eric Zheng, President of AmCham Shanghai, shared his perspectives on the Expo’s significance. He noted that the CIIE serves as a vital platform, especially in today’s climate of rising protectionism. 

Zheng also emphasized the enduring partnership between U.S. companies and China, pointing out their decades-long involvement in the Chinese market. According to Zheng, U.S. companies have embraced the philosophy of being “in China, for China,” and he believes that the vast market and China’s manufacturing capabilities are the two major factors that will continue driving growth for U.S. companies in China going forward.

Looking ahead, Zheng reaffirmed his commitment, as the President of AmCham Shanghai, to promote U.S.-China commercial relationship. “I firmly believe that a healthy, fair, and sustainable commercial relationship between the United States and China is in the best interest of both nations,” he said.

SFC Markets and Finance: The 7th CIIE has recently concluded.What signal did the Chinese government send from the CIIE?

Eric Zheng: I think it sends a very strong and clear signal that China welcomes products and services from other countries and offers a great market for them. Most importantly, China has demonstrated its commitment to opening up to the outside world and its willingness to remain an active participant in the globalization process moving forward.

SFC Markets and Finance: After 7 years of development,do you think the CIIE has been a key player in international trade?

Eric Zheng: The CIIE is one of the very few, if not the only, expos focused on imports. This year marks the 7th time China has hosted this event. Looking at the participants, there were nearly 3,500 exhibitors from 129 countries and regions, including the U.S., with agreements reached on approximately $80 billion worth of products and services. It was a successful expo commercially.

I believe it plays a critical role in the current environment, where protectionism is increasingly widespread. China is taking the lead in promoting free trade, which is quite important.

SFC Markets and Finance: Would you like to share the results of American Pavilion throughout this event?

Eric Zheng: The American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai worked jointly with the U.S. Department of Commerce to host an American Pavilion focused on promoting U.S. food and agricultural products. This was our second year participating; we started last year and expanded this year, bringing 14 exhibitors representing over 30 companies and organizations to showcase their products.

By the end of the Expo, we reached agreements valued at $711 million, reflecting a 41% growth over last year. This result exceeded our expectations and demonstrated, once again, that the CIIE is a highly effective platform for promoting foreign products in this vital market.

SFC Markets and Finance: Will your chamber attend the 8th CIIE?

Eric Zheng: Of course, we will attend the 8th CIIE. As I mentioned, this is our second year, and we’ve already started planning for next year. Over the past two years, we have focused exclusively on food and agriculture, but we are also discussing the possibility of expanding into other sectors, since the CIIE is organized by industries.

U.S. companies have participated in the CIIE since its inception, representing a wide range of industries. In fact, U.S. companies accounted for the largest exhibition area in the first year. Many of our member companies have been regular participants, with some attending all seven consecutive years.

Our focus remains on supporting relatively smaller companies that may not be able to participate independently. While larger companies attend every year, we aim to provide a platform to help smaller businesses to come, and attract those companies to showcase their products in the Chinese market.

SFC Markets and Finance: So what other sectors will your chamber focus on next year?

Eric Zheng: This year, we actually considered including some technology-related companies alongside our food and agriculture focus. However, it was challenging to combine the two, which is a technical issue we have to figure out. That said, it would be great to bring more innovative American companies to this market. There are many U.S. companies with excellent products, particularly in the technology sector.

SFC Markets and Finance: Like you said, there are many U.S. companies in China. How can Chinese and the U.S. companies enhance cooperation?

Eric Zheng: Over the past four decades, U.S. companies have participated in the Chinese market through direct investment and exports. A few days ago, I attended 3M’s 40th anniversary in China. As one of the earliest investors, 3M has done very well, and many other companies have also been here for decades, operating successfully.

These companies are “in China, for China,” they're operating in China, producing and selling locally. At the same time, China’s strong manufacturing capabilities make it a key part of the global supply chain. U.S. companies will continue to operate, invest, source products from China, sell to China, and also export “Made in China” products to other parts of the world.

So the market itself, plus the manufacturing capabilities, those are the two huge factors that will drive our growth in China going forward.

SFC Markets and Finance: So is it possible that "in China, for global" will be a new, popular trend in the future?

Eric Zheng: I think we’re in a new era where globalization is facing some headwinds. However, it still makes sense to manage supply chains globally, or in some cases, more regionally. For example, if you make products in China, you can sell them within this region.

Take Tesla as an example. Its Gigafactory in Shanghai not only serves the Chinese market but increasingly targets Southeast Asia, South Asia, and other regional markets. With one Gigafactory in Shanghai, Tesla can cover the entire region.

And Tesla can rely on its Gigafactory in Germany to cover Europe, and its operations in Texas and elsewhere in the U.S. cover the Americas. Supply chains are shifting towards a more regional approach rather than a global one.

SFC Markets and Finance: China-U.S. relation has experienced ups and downs in the past 45 years. From your perspective, what changes has U.S.-China trade relation made?

Eric Zheng: The U.S. and China have come a long way. We are in Shanghai, where the Shanghai Communique was signed, not far from our office at the Jinjiang Hotel. At that time, the U.S. and China had a very limited commercial relationship, it was more of a political one.

But over the decades, despite challenges and differences in recent years, the bilateral trade relationship has continued to grow. Trade and commerce now form a significant part of the bilateral relationship.

Our hope is that despite the challenges and differences, the two countries can address those issues while finding ways to collaborate, especially in trade and commerce. The two economies are complementary and can benefit greatly from trading with each other. Free trade will be good for both sides.

SFC Markets and Finance: Maybe we'll have new challenges, because Donald Trump will be next president of the US. What's the impact of Trump on China's policy?

Eric Zheng: I think it’s too early to assess the new administration’s policy on China. However, we are hopeful that it will recognize the importance of the bilateral trade and commercial relationship and work to support a healthy, fair, and sustainable trade relationship between the two countries. Because at the end of the day, the bilateral trade relationship between the two countries, also between the two peoples, are in the best interest of these two countries.

SFC Markets and Finance: Do you think Trump will influence the international order?

Eric Zheng: As I said, it’s too early to tell. During the campaign, the President-elect mentioned high tariffs, not just on China but on other countries as well. We believe high tariffs are not the best way to address market access or trade issues.

In fact, high tariffs tend to hurt consumers more than exporters and are not going to be helpful for inflation. Our hope is that the new administration will take these factors into consideration. Our companies want to continue succeeding in China, and high tariffs are not beneficial for businesses or for either side.

SFC Markets and Finance: We know Elon Musk is close to Trump. Will he be a key player on Trump's China policy?

Eric Zheng: Certainly, Elon Musk knows China really well, and the Tesla Gigafactory in Shanghai has been a great commercial success. The speed at which the project was approved and built was amazing, something even Elon Musk himself praised. It’s often referred to as “Shanghai speed” or “China speed” and has become a model for Tesla worldwide. I understand Elon Musk even thought about replicating the Shanghai model in Texas and Germany, though it would not be that easy due to differences between countries. 

At this point, I'm not quite sure how involved he will be in the administration. Recent reports suggest he might focus more on improving the efficiency of the U.S. Federal Government rather than on foreign policy.

SFC Markets and Finance: Do you believe the trade will still be the bedrock of China-U.S. relation?

Eric Zheng: I think so, and I certainly hope so. Despite the differences between the U.S. and China, trade and commerce remain critical to the bilateral relationship. As mentioned earlier, the two countries have highly complementary economies, and by working together, they can create greater value for both countries and their peoples. It’s in their best interest to cooperate, and I am hopeful that the trading relationship will continue for long term.

SFC Markets and Finance: It has been almost five years since China's Foreign Investment Law was implemented in January 2020, what changes have you seen on China's business climate?

Eric Zheng: A lot of positive changes, I can certainly name a few.

From a market access standpoint, I think China has made a lot of progress by using the negative list. If you recall back in 2013, China decided to use the negative list to regulate foreign investment. And back then, there were 190 categories that were on that negative list, meaning, if you're in one of those categories, you're not allowed or you're restricted, to invest in China. 

And In the manufacturing sector, the market is now completely open. In financial services, including insurance, there have also been significant changes. For example, a few years ago, a joint venture capped at 50% ownership was required to establish a life insurance company in China. Now, foreign companies can own up to 100%, which is a major improvement.

Now there are also challenges, if you're talking about business climate in addition to regulations. Certainly, the market is becoming more mature as China grows, and there are more players in the market. So I think domestic competition is becoming a challenge for foreign investors.

Additionally, the economy is no longer experiencing double-digit growth, reflecting a new normal. Multinational companies, including U.S. firms, must adapt to this new environment. It's a lot more competitive than in other markets.

To succeed, U.S. companies need to bring the latest technologies, identify their competitive advantages, and be highly selective about their strategies. Unlike 10 or 20 years ago, you could easily come in and set up a company and do well, not anymore. You have to know exactly what you're going to do, and you have to adapt to the local market in order to succeed going forward.

SFC Markets and Finance: Speaking of business climate, what did you hear from your chamber's members? What do they satisfy or concern the most?

Eric Zheng: We have top three concerns. Number one is the uncertain bilateral relationship, geopolitics, it's kind of out of our hands. But still, that's definitely the number one concern.

Number two is the slowdown of the economy. As I said earlier, the economy is becoming more mature, so it's no longer growing at the double digit rate, so we have to deal with that.

And the third one, also I already mentioned, it was the domestic competition. So those are the three top headwinds that we have to deal with.

SFC Markets and Finance: How about the regulations?

Eric Zheng: Well, we certainly continue to see some improvement in regulations, based on our survey this time. And certainly I think we feel there's more transparency from a regulation standpoint. 

And the various levels of government, they try very hard to support foreign businesses, including our member companies. 

Since the end of COVID I think we've seen tremendous efforts by the government at various levels, central, provincial and local, trying to support foreign-invested companies as much as they can. So we really appreciate those efforts.

SFC Markets and Finance: So the third plenum send a strong message on high standard opening up, how do you think about this message?

Eric Zheng: We certainly followed closely the resolution of the third plenum in recent months. And I think the message was very clear and strong. China remains open to the outside world.

For us, we were encouraged by that message. We're looking for rule-based, internationalized, equal, business environment for us to operate in, and actually for foreign companies, particularly our companies, we're not looking for a special treatment. So I think one critical element is really just national treatment. You're providing level playing field for everybody to operate in. That's kind of important for us.

The other certainly is market access. We need to continue to open up. I think even the third plenum resolution mentioned that China needs to continue to shorten the negative list. We talked earlier about, coming down to less than 30, but there are still about 30 categories that are off limits to foreign investment. I think China can continue to shorten that list by opening up more sectors.

And then also, I think it’s important, as mentioned in the resolution, to protect the legal rights of foreign investors.

One key area is intellectual property (IP) protection. Over the years, China has developed an extensive set of rules and regulations to safeguard IP. However, there is room for improvement in enforcement—how to ensure these rules are implemented there is disputes, and how to effectively utilize the legal system and courts to deal with such issues.

Overall, the third plenum has sent a strong message to foreign investors that China will remain open to foreign investment and continue to protect foreign investment going forward, for the long term.

SFC Markets and Finance: What are the reactions of chamber's member to the third plenum?

Eric Zheng: The third plenum, the resolution, certainly was sending a strong message in a conceptual way.

I think our members certainly will be interested in finding more about the details. Oftentimes, those details will come up later on. The party, the CCP plenum would just describe the vision, to be followed by the government and the People's Congress later on, to make more detailed measures. So we're looking for more specific measures going forward.

SFC Markets and Finance: Actually, that's what we look forward too.

Eric Zheng: How do you going forward? How do you continue to open up to the outside world? Market access would be one, and national treatment will be another one, then protection of our legal rights.

So I think, those are all concepts, but it's really, at the end of the day, it comes down to implementation. How do you deal with specific cases? The concepts are all there, I think the rules and regulations are there, but we need to really follow, monitor the implementation of those rules and regulations.

SFC Markets and Finance: China released a series of stimulus measures. How do you comment on these new measures?

Eric Zheng: Very significant and timely.

In fact, we, together with other experts, we're already talking about some of these measures, the importance of these measures, particularly after COVID. And I think this was very timely.

The latest round of stimulus measures were very timely and also quite significant. The impression that we had was these measures were targeting more the supply side, and also try to help local governments relieve some of their local debt.

We believe that the demand side also is very important. At some point we need more measures to stimulate the demand side, because at this point a big issue is the consumer confidence is not there yet. So we need to figure out a way to deal with that.

And we're talking about some more structural issues, like the wealth gap between urban areas and rural areas.

How do you allow, encourage more rural population people move to the cities? How do you do that? Because at this point, China's urbanization rate is still in the mid-60s, you need more advanced economy, usually it's over 80%.

So every time you move one percentage point of rural population to urban regions, you can actually increase investment and increase consumption in a big way. So the question is, how do you achieve that?

There are some very structural issues that the government will have to deal with.And of course, other cost concerns, like medical you know, health care, education, housing, for instance, retirement, and those are all long term issues.

People are worried about those costs. That's probably why they're not too willing to spend at this point. So I think the government has to deal with those more structural issues as well, in order to truly stimulate the demand side.

SFC Markets and Finance: So are you still optimistic about Chinese economy?

Eric Zheng: Certainly. We’re not expecting double-digit growth anymore because China has become a more mature economy, it’s the second-largest economy. 

Last year, its GDP was close to $18 trillion. So even a 5% growth rate will create close to $900 billion, equivalent to the size of Switzerland's economy. So, we need to be realistic about GDP targets. Personally, I would be very happy with 5% growth.

More importantly, I think we shouldn't really focus too much on specific GDP figures like 5% or 4.5%. It’s more important to focus on more quality growth. I think the Chinese government is aware of that, trying to grow more of a quality growth, more innovative, greener and so forth.

China is now in a different phase of development, and domestic consumption will play a critical role. With the external environment shifting, China will no longer rely heavily on exports or infrastructure development, we've done a lot already.

The next focus really should be on domestic consumption. How are we going to develop a strong demand base domestically, so that we can truly have this new circulation going, external versus internal. That's going to be a big, maybe a long term effort, but it's something that's very necessary for China to continue to grow sustainably.

SFC Markets and Finance: We talked a lot about China's economy. So is it a good time for U.S. companies to continue investing in China? Why?

Eric Zheng: I think they have to be more selective, unlike 20 some years ago, even 30 years ago, it would be very easy to make a case to invest in China. And now we are in a new era, when China is no longer growing double digit, and China is perceived having some risk issues, supply chains and so forth. So I think for U.S. companies to make a decision to invest in China, they have to be more selective, right?

At this point, I still believe that China will remain as one of the most attractive markets, for certainly the size of its market, but also its capability in terms manufacturing. I can't think of another country that is close to China in terms of that scale. So for the next decade or so, China will remain as a very important destination for foreign direct investment.

SFC Markets and Finance: Maybe India will be an alternative?

Eric Zheng: India has some similar attributes in terms of population. It certainly has more people now than China. And China, that's another structural issue that China has to deal with is the low birth rate.

In fact, the population has had negative growth two years in a row now, we don't have enough babies, right? So India has more people, but India has its own issues, the infrastructure is not there, it's not a one single market, not like China.

It's separated into different markets, with different rules and regulations and different infrastructure levels. I think India certainly has potential, because of some of these attributes, like population, labor force, but it's not close to China at this point.

SFC Markets and Finance: As the first Chinese president of AmCham Shanghai, how will you promote the China-U.S. relation even further?

Eric Zheng: As the President of AmCham Shanghai, I essentially work for our member companies, and our member companies continue to see China as a very, very important market for them.

So for me, as the President, I work for them, and I will continue to promote U.S.-China commercial relationship. Because I share that view that healthy, fair and sustainable trade and commercial relationship between the United States and China are in the best interest of both countries. And I'll spare no efforts in terms of promoting healthy and fair and sustainable commercial relationship between these two countries.

SFC Markets and Finance: Actually, you are an American Chinese, and you can speak Chinese. Will this bring your positive aspects to communicate with the governments?

Eric Zheng: I think so. When you look at our member companies these days, if you look at their CEO, C-suites, so to speak, most of the companies have already localized their operations.

When I say localize, meaning the CEO is somebody from China, or somebody who's gone overseas and come back a returnee, as we say. Why? Because of the language ability, being able to speak both Chinese and English, but also bi-cultural understanding, both cultures.

So I think in the current environment, that attribute is quite important, I would argue is critical, if you want to succeed in this market. If you don't speak the language, if you don't understand the culture, it will be very difficult to succeed commercially. So that's why you see the localization trend happening, not only in businesses, but also in the sector like I'm in. It's a trade association, it's a nonprofit organization, but I'm the president, and I speak both languages, and I understand both cultures.

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