China Signs Pact With Taiwan to Open Services Trade Sectors

China and Taiwan, governed separately since a civil war six-decades ago, agreed to give each others’ companies greater access to their services markets as commercial ties deepen across the Taiwan Strait.

The agreement allows Taiwanese companies to take controlling stakes in China joint ventures, streamline approvals and expand geographic operations in sectors including banking, hospitals, construction and tourism, according to the text of the pact posted on Taiwan’s Straits Exchange Foundation website. It was signed today in Shanghai by the heads of the SEF and China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits.