Call for investing in diverse overseas projects

Vice-Premier Wang Yang called on Tuesday for outbound investors to explore new areas such as infrastructure, renewable energy and advanced manufacturing.

“Last year, China ranked third in the world in terms of outward direct investment flows, after the United States and Japan, but there’s much room for further development,” he said.

Investors can broaden their cooperation scope and improve the level of bilateral or multilateral economic and trade cooperation, he said at the opening ceremony of Fifth China Overseas Investment Fair, which ends today in Beijing.

Wang added that the approval process for outbound investment will be shortened to help Chinese enterprises to go global.

In 2012, China’s overseas investment reached $87.8 billion, up 17.6 percent year- on- year. In the first 10 months of this year, the nation’s ODI rose 19.6 percent to $69.5 billion, according to the Ministry of Commerce.

Outbound investment is now rising faster than foreign direct investment into China.

Zhang Xiaoqiang, viceminister of the National Development and Reform Commission, said that overseas investment is likely to hit a record this year.

“We are pretty sure that this year, we will be able to realize our goals for economic and social development, and that will make China a strong direct investor on the global stage,” Zhang said.

The world’s secondlargest economy has seen rapid economic growth amid reform and openingup during recent decades, prompting more domestic companies to expand and pursue merger and acquisition deals in overseas markets.

Those moves have allowed companies to secure resources and improve their core competitiveness.

But China’s ODI lacks balance in terms of investment regions and industries, industry sources said.

A report from global consulting company Ernst & Young LLP said that energy and metals drew the most money. Those sectors accounted for about 70 percent of China’s outbound FDI during the period from 2005 to June 30 this year.

Eleanor Wu, head of the transaction advisory services department at E&Y, said that energy and mining remain the top targets for China’s outbound investment, both in deal numbers and value, and that’s expected to continue.

“If you look at the merger and acquisition activities this year, nine big deals in the energy and mining sector reached more than $ 100 million for the first eight months of this year,” she said, adding that those deals are key for China to secure energy supplies for growing domestic demand.

“But sectors including agriculture and food products and renewable energy are growing as well,” she said.