

China plans to relax visa policies and make it easier for foreigners to qualify for permanent residence in a bid to attract overseas talent and investment.

According to CCTV, as well as making it easier to settle in China, the government plans to expand the social security system to cover foreigners, affording them the same retirement, unemployment, medical and maternity benefits enjoyed by Chinese citizens.

China’s Ministry of Public Security lists seven types of employment which allow a foreign resident to apply for a Chinese green card. These include working at national laboratories, engineering research centers, technology centers of state-accredited high-tech companies and foreign-funded R&D centers.

Applicants are still required to jump through several hoops. They must hold professional titles at or above associate professor or associate fellow and have four years of work experience in China.

A report by CareerBuilder, a US-based job website, said that close to 70 percent chose China because of its “fast development momentum” and “steady economic growth”.



Between 2011 and 2015, 3 million foreign “experts” began working in China, an increase of 30 percent over the preceding five years according to official statistics.

Speaking to CCTV News, IT manager Daniel Hjelm said that he saw opportunities and potential in China. “Industry is really booming here, therefore you can make our own footprint, you don’t touch so much legacy of how things used to run,” he said. “It’s creating the market of many fields for the first time,”

China is also eager to get their hands on foreign money, unsurprising given that $676 billion left the country last year as concerns over the economy grow.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Thursday that China would work towards “creating a favorable environment for foreign companies and protecting the legal rights of foreign investors.”

It made the comments in response to an AmCham survey which said that 25 percent of US companies in China were planning to leave the country.

[Images via CCTV]

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