China on Sunday unveiled a new, shortened negative list for foreign investment, cutting the items down from 48 to 40, and issued a new catalogue to expand foreign investment in the country's high-end manufacturing sectors, in the latest move to honor its commitment to further open up its economy.   

The newly released negative list and foreign investment catalogue showed the country's firm determination to further open up the market at its own pace and offer dividends from its economic growth to the world, analysts noted.

Jointly released by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the Ministry of Commerce, the new negative list will become effective on July 30. 

A separate list governing foreign investment in China's free trade zones slashed restrictive areas from 45 to 37. 

Furthermore, the NDRC vowed to scrap each and every obstacle still existing outside the boundaries of the negative list before the end of the year.

The negative list will introduce a greater opening-up of the market and allow foreign investors to run majority-share controlling or wholly owned businesses in more sectors.

Shortening the negative list was not a forced move, it is China's new effort to further pursue opening-up, which features a broader scope and higher level of market access, Bai Ming, deputy director of the Ministry of Commerce's International Market Research Institute, told the Global Times on Sunday.

It will give China the courage and leverage to confront the trade tensions with the US, Bai said, noting that as the new negative list will cover more specific sectors such as cinema, relevant management should follow up to ensure sound operations of foreign capital in the domestic market. 

Some of the major sectors included on the list are: shipping agents, urban gas, cinemas, telecoms, performance brokerages, and oil and gas exploration and developments.

More than 80 percent of the newly opened or modified investment fields are in manufacturing, including 5G core components, semiconductors, chip making, and cloud computing.

China's support to foreign investment in some sensitive sectors like 5G core components and semiconductors shows its efforts to "find a balance between its domestic economic structure reconstructing and concerns from the global market that China may seek independent development on the technology," said Song Guoyou, director of Fudan University's Center for Economic Diplomacy.

The opening-up of China's energy industry like oil and gas exploration is related to national security, and the country is able to prevent and control risks, Song said. 

Foreign firms will be treated on an equal basis with Chinese companies when they enter the industries in China, experts said, but also noted that they are expected to comply with relevant local laws and rules.

The list, with the official name "Special Administrative Measures on Access to Foreign Investment (Negative List) (2019 Version)," will substitute A Catalogue for Guiding Foreign Investment revised in 2018.