On January 12, the Sichuan Provincial Bureau of Economic Cooperation released the Guidelines for Foreign Investment in Sichuan (hereinafter referred to as the Guidelines).

▲Picture from Sichuan Provincial Bureau of Economic Cooperation

The Guidelines have six parts, including the preface, industrial investment guidelines, regional investment guidelines, investment vehicles, investment service institutions and appendix, to show the advantages and investment opportunities of Sichuan's investment environment in an all-round and comprehensive way.

Part I: Preface. This part focuses on the introduction of Sichuan Province, it outlines the basic situation of Sichuan's high-quality development, the long history of opening up, and the basic conditions and good momentum for high-level opening up.

Part II: Industrial Investment Guidelines. According to the Catalogue of Encouraged Industries for Foreign Investment, the current development status, investment advantages and investment orientations of each industry are analyzed around the construction of "5+1" modern industrial system, "4+6" modern service system, "10+3" modern agricultural system to focus on chain supplementing, enhancing and expanding; this will help to further guide foreign investment and help to build a new development pattern.

Part III: Regional Investment Guidelines. This part focuses on the regional layout and industrial development orientation of the five economic zones in our province, including Chengdu Plain Economic Zone, Southern Sichuan Economic Zone, Northeast Sichuan Economic Zone, Panxi Economic Zone and Northwest Sichuan Ecological Demonstration Zone, and introduces the profile, industrial bases and investment focus of each city (prefecture) in the economic zones, which is conducive to guiding foreign investment to the key development areas and advantageous industries in Sichuan Province and helping to build an important economic center with national influence.

Part IV: Investment Vehicles. This part highlights the planning area, development status and investment orientation of the China (Sichuan) Pilot Free Trade Zone, 7 international cooperation parks, 22 national development zones, to provide information for global investors willing to invest in Sichuan for their easy reference in a transparent and fair manner.

Part V and Part VI are Investment Service Institutions and Appendix. These two parts mainly introduce the contact information of the province's investment service departments and national parks, and sort out practical information such as the process of setting up foreign-invested enterprises, the process of receiving complaints from foreign enterprises, and the compilation of policies for foreign investors' reference.

The Sichuan Provincial Bureau of Economic Cooperation suggested that the Guidelines provide a comprehensive display of the business environment and investment policies in Sichuan; it is an important step to speed up the construction of market-oriented and international business environment ruled by law in Sichuan, and a know-it-all manual for investment in Sichuan. On one hand, the content focuses on the practical use. As the first service guidance prepared in Sichuan specifically for foreign investors, the Guidelines pay special attention to the practicality of the content, and is structured based on investment elements of most concern to foreign investors, and written in concise language based on basic data and materials without lengthy, fancy words, to help foreign investors to make decisions. On the other hand, it has streamlined composing. The Guidelines are printed in separate volumes in English and Chinese, and the digital materials are presented in figures and diagrams and the policy measures are available through scanning of QR codes provided in the manual to make the whole book more clear and portable.