- At the national level, manufacturing is effectively open, agriculture and mining carry a few hard prohibitions, and services, media, education and healthcare hold most remaining restrictions.
全国层面制造业基本放开；农业与矿业保留少量硬性禁止；服务业、传媒、教育、医疗承载了剩余限制的主要部分。- Agriculture bans investment in rare-Chinese-variety R&D/breeding, transgenic breeding, and fishing in Chinese waters; seed production carries equity conditions (wheat ≥34% Chinese minority, corn Chinese-controlled).
农业禁止稀有良种研发养殖、转基因育种及中国水域捕捞；种业有股比条件（小麦中方股比不低于 34%、玉米须中方控股）。- Mining prohibits exploration, mining and beneficiation of rare earths, radioactive minerals and tungsten.
矿业禁止稀土、放射性矿产、钨的勘查、开采及选矿。- Manufacturing has no foreign-access condition nationally; the one utility exception is that nuclear-power plant construction and operation must be Chinese-controlled.
制造业全国层面无外资准入条件；公用事业唯一例外是核电站建设、经营须中方控股。- Transport requires Chinese control of domestic water and public air transport (foreign airline stake capped at 25%); postal and domestic letter express delivery are prohibited.
交通要求国内水路与公共航空运输中方控股（外资航空公司持股上限 25%）；邮政及国内信件快递禁止。- Telecom caps foreign value-added equity generally at 50% (with exceptions) and requires Chinese control of basic telecom; many internet-content services are banned nationally.
电信增值业务外资股比一般不超 50%（部分除外），基础电信须中方控股；多项互联网内容服务全国禁止。- Healthcare limits medical institutions to joint ventures, and culture/media are the most restrictive block (news agencies, publishing, broadcasting, film, internet cafés banned; troupes Chinese-controlled).
医疗将医疗机构限于合资；文化传媒限制最密集（新闻机构、出版、广电、电影、网吧禁止；文艺团体中方控股）。- Apply a three-step test: (1) is the sector on the 29-item negative list? (2) does it need an ordinary industry licence? (3) is it on the encouraged catalogue for preferences?
套用三步测试：(1) 行业是否在 29 条负面清单上？(2) 是否需要一般行业许可？(3) 是否在鼓励目录上以适用优惠？
Industry restrictions by sector: a quick map | 分行业外资限制速览地图
Overview
Foreign investment in China is governed by a three-part map: a negative list of restricted and prohibited sectors, a complementary catalogue of encouraged industries, and a layer of ordinary licences that apply to all investors. This article condenses the operative 2024 negative list (29 restrictive items) and the 2025 encouraged catalogue into a sector-by-sector view, so an investor can quickly see whether a target industry is prohibited, restricted, or welcomed — and what to check next.
The single most important takeaway: at the national level, manufacturing is now effectively open, agriculture and mining carry a handful of hard prohibitions, and services, media, education and healthcare retain the bulk of the remaining restrictions. Everything else is, in principle, accessible on equal terms with domestic capital. Because the list is revised on a continuing basis and pilots move faster than the national text, the map below should be re-checked against the current FTZ and Hainan catalogues before any binding decision.
Agriculture, forestry, fisheries and mining
Agriculture is mostly open, but a few items are hard prohibitions: investment in the R&D, breeding and cultivation of China’s rare and unique fine varieties is banned; transgenic breeding of crops, livestock and fry is banned; and fishing in China’s jurisdictional waters and inland waters is banned. Equity conditions apply to seed production — wheat new-variety breeding and seed production require Chinese minority equity of at least 34%, and corn new-variety breeding and seed production must be Chinese-controlled.
Mining is narrow but absolute: exploration, mining and beneficiation of rare earths, radioactive minerals and tungsten are prohibited. By contrast, the encouraged catalogue actively invites foreign investment in oil and gas exploration, mine-tailings utilisation and low-grade ore beneficiation, reflecting a deliberate policy tilt toward upstream technology and resource efficiency rather than raw extraction.
Manufacturing and utilities
Manufacturing is, nationally, fully open after the 2024 revision — no equity cap, no legal-form requirement, no management-nationality rule. The encouraged catalogue strongly steers foreign capital here: advanced materials, high-end chemicals, pharmaceuticals and biologics, medical devices, high-performance fibres and green-chemistry entries all appear, and the 2025 edition added items such as nucleic-acid-drug development, zero-magnetic medical equipment, smart inspection equipment and subsea operation robots. Utilities carry one notable condition: nuclear-power plant construction and operation must be Chinese-controlled.
Transport, wholesale and retail
Transport concentrates several restrictions. Domestic water-transport companies must be Chinese-controlled; public air-transport companies must be Chinese-controlled with a single foreign investor and affiliates capped at 25% and a Chinese-national legal representative; general-aviation companies are limited to Chinese control (except agriculture/forestry/fishery carriers, which may be joint ventures); civil-airport construction and operation must be Chinese relatively controlled, and foreigners may not build or run the control tower. Postal companies and domestic letter express delivery are prohibited. Wholesale and retail simply prohibits tobacco (leaf, cigarettes, reprocessed tobacco and related products) distribution.
Telecom, IT, professional and R&D services
Telecom is capped: foreign investment is limited to WTO-accession-committed services, with value-added telecom foreign equity generally no more than 50% (e-commerce, domestic multi-party communication, store-and-forward and call centres excepted), and basic telecom must be Chinese-controlled. A long list of internet-content services is prohibited nationally — internet news, online publishing, online audiovisual programmes, internet culture operation (except music) and public information-release services. Professional services prohibit Chinese legal affairs (litigation agency, non-litigation Chinese-law services). Humanities and social-science research institutes are prohibited; education limits schools to Chinese-led Sino-foreign cooperation.
Healthcare, culture, media and “other”
Healthcare limits medical institutions to joint ventures. Culture and media are the most restrictive block: news agencies, book/newspaper/periodical and audiovisual publishing and production, radio/TV stations and transmission networks, film production/distribution/exhibition, internet cafés, and certain cultural-operation items are prohibited; performing troupes must be Chinese-controlled. The “other” category bans weapons and ammunition manufacturing and a few heritage-craft items (ivory carving, tiger-bone processing, Xuan paper and ink-stick production).
The encouraged side is broad and growing: the 2025 catalogue (effective 2026-02-01) totals 1,679 entries — 619 national and 1,060 regional — and explicitly adds advanced manufacturing, modern services (business services, R&D, service consumption) and central/western/ northeastern/Hainan items, signalling where policy wants foreign capital to land.
A practical reading method
To read the map correctly, an investor should apply a simple three-step test. Step one: is the sector on the 29-item negative list? If prohibited, stop. If restricted, note the specific condition. If absent, proceed to step two: does the sector need an ordinary industry licence (telecom, medical, financial, food)? That licence is not a foreign restriction but is still a real gate. Step three: is the project on the encouraged catalogue, opening a possible preference? Running these three steps in order avoids the two common errors — assuming “off the list” means “no licence needed”, and assuming “restricted” means “impossible” when it may only mean “meet the equity condition”.
What to do next
Common misreads
Investors routinely make three errors when reading the map. One is reading only the negative list and forgetting the ordinary industry licence that may still gate the sector — “off the list” is not “ungated”. A second is confusing “encouraged” with “unrestricted”: an encouraged project still clears the same negative-list and licence tests; the catalogue adds a preference, it does not remove a restriction. A third is treating a restricted item as a ban; many restrictions are equity or control conditions that a structure can satisfy, not absolute prohibitions. Applying the three-step test in the previous section keeps all three straight.
- Read the target sector against the 29-item 2024 negative list before any structure decision; prohibited is prohibited, restricted means a licence/equity condition applies.
- For manufacturing, plan as a domestic-equivalent entity — no foreign-access approval is required at the national level.
- For services/media/education/healthcare, expect pilot-by-pilot variation; check the FTZ and Hainan catalogues city by city.
- Cross-check the 2025 encouraged catalogue to see whether the project qualifies for preference (e.g., tilted CIT in qualifying zones).
- Where a licence is needed, confirm it is an industry licence, not a foreign-access restriction — the pathway and timeline differ.
- Re-run the three-step test whenever the pilot catalogues are updated, which happens more often than the national list.
Sources
- Full text: Special Measures for Foreign Investment Access (Negative List) (2024 Edition) (State Council / gov.cn)
- NDRC & MOFCOM release the Catalogue of Encouraged Industries for Foreign Investment (2025 Edition) (NDRC)
- NDRC spokesperson Q&A on the 2025 Encouraged Catalogue (NDRC)
- MOFCOM spokesperson Q&A on the 2025 Encouraged Catalogue (MOFCOM)
Related reading
- see also: 2026 Negative List for foreign investment: what changed
- see also: FIE admission rules: approval vs. filing
- see also: National security review of foreign investment
分行业外资限制速览地图
概述
中国外资准入由三部分构成：列明限制与禁止行业的负面清单、互补的鼓励类产业目录，以及对所有投资者适用的一般许可层。本文把现行 2024 年版负面清单（29 条限制措施）与 2025 年鼓励目录浓缩为分行业视图，便于投资者快速判断目标行业是禁止、限制还是鼓励，以及下一步应核查什么。
最重要的结论是：全国层面制造业已基本放开；农业与矿业保留少量硬性禁止；服务业、传媒、教育、医疗承载了剩余限制的主要部分；其余行业原则上与内资平等准入。由于清单持续修订、试点快于全国文本，任何约束性决策前都应重新对照现行自贸区与海南目录。
农业、林业、渔业与矿业
农业大体开放，但有若干硬性禁止：禁止投资中国稀有和特有的珍贵优良品种的研发、养殖、种植及相关繁殖材料生产；禁止农作物、种畜禽、水产苗种转基因品种选育及其转基因种子（苗）生产；禁止中国管辖海域及内陆水域水产品捕捞。种业有股比条件——小麦新品种选育和种子生产中方股比不低于 34%，玉米新品种选育和种子生产须由中方控股。
矿业范围窄但绝对：禁止投资稀土、放射性矿产、钨的勘查、开采及选矿。与之相对，鼓励目录积极邀请外资进入石油天然气勘探、尾矿利用、低品位矿选矿等领域，反映政策有意向上游技术与资源效率而非原料开采倾斜。
制造业与公用事业
制造业在 2024 年修订后全国层面完全放开——无股比上限、无组织形式要求、无管理人员国籍要求。鼓励目录强力引导外资投向此处：先进材料、高端化工、药品与生物制品、医疗器械、高性能纤维、绿色化工等均列入，2025 年版新增核酸类药物开发、零磁医学装备、智能检测装备、水下作业机器人等。公用事业保留一项重要条件：核电站的建设、经营须由中方控股。
交通、批发与零售
交通集中了若干限制。国内水上运输公司须由中方控股；公共航空运输公司须由中方控股，且一家外商及其关联企业投资比例不得超过 25%、法定代表人须为中国籍公民；通用航空公司限于中方控股（农、林、渔业通用航空限于合资）；民用机场建设、经营须由中方相对控股，外方不得参与建设、运营机场塔台。邮政公司及信件国内快递业务禁止。批发零售仅禁止烟叶、卷烟、复烤烟叶及其他烟草制品的批发、零售。
电信、信息技术、专业服务与研发
电信设上限：限于入世承诺开放业务，增值电信外资股比一般不超过 50%（电子商务、国内多方通信、存储转发、呼叫中心除外），基础电信须由中方控股。多项互联网内容服务全国禁止——互联网新闻、网络出版、网络视听节目、互联网文化经营（音乐除外）、互联网公众发布信息服务等。专业服务禁止中国法律事务（诉讼代理、非诉讼中国法律服务）。人文社会科学研究机构禁止；教育将学校限于中方主导的中外合作办学。
医疗、文化、传媒及其他
医疗将医疗机构限于合资。文化传媒是限制最密集的板块：新闻机构，图书报刊音像电子出版物的编辑出版制作，广播电视台站及传输覆盖网，电影制作发行放映，网吧，以及部分文化经营项目均禁止；文艺表演团体须由中方控股。”其他”类禁止武器弹药制造，以及象牙雕刻、虎骨加工、宣纸和墨锭生产等少数传统工艺。
鼓励面广泛且扩张：2025 年版目录（2026 年 2 月 1 日施行）共 1,679 条——全国 619 条、地区 1,060 条——明确新增先进制造业、现代服务业（商务服务、技术服务、服务消费）以及中西部、东北、海南条目，标示政策希望外资落地的方向。
实用读法
为正确读图，投资者应套用简单的三步测试。第一步：行业是否在 29 条负面清单上？若禁止，停止。若受限，记下具体条件。若不在，进入第二步：行业是否需要一般行业许可（电信、医疗、金融、食品）？该许可不是外资限制，但仍是真实关卡。第三步：项目是否在鼓励目录上，从而可能适用优惠？按顺序走这三步可避免两类常见错误——以为”不在清单”即”无需许可”，以及以为”受限”即”不可能”，而它或许仅意味”满足股比条件”。
下一步建议
常见误读
投资者读图时常犯三类错误。一是只读负面清单，忘记仍可能关卡该行业的一般行业许可——”不在清单”不等于”无关卡”。二是将”鼓励”混同”不受限”：鼓励类项目仍须通过同样的负面清单与许可测试；目录只追加优惠，不移除限制。三是把受限项当禁止：许多限制是可满足股比或控制条件的股权要求，而非绝对禁止。套用前文三步测试可使三者各归其位。
- 在任何架构决策前，先将目标行业对照 29 条的 2024 年版负面清单；禁止即禁止，限制意味着需满足许可／股比条件。
- 制造业：按内资等同实体规划——全国层面无需外资准入审批。
- 服务业／传媒／教育／医疗：预期”逐试点”差异，按城市核对自贸区与海南目录。
- 交叉核对 2025 年鼓励目录，判断项目是否适用优惠（如符合条件的区域企业所得税倾斜）。
- 如需许可，确认其属行业许可而非外资准入限制——路径与耗时不同。
- 试点目录更新频率高于全国清单，每次更新都重新跑三步测试。
来源
- 《外商投资准入特别管理措施（负面清单）（2024 年版）》全文（国务院 / 中国政府网）
- 国家发展改革委、商务部发布《鼓励外商投资产业目录（2025 年版）》（国家发展改革委）
- 国家发展改革委新闻发言人就 2025 年版鼓励目录答记者问（国家发展改革委）
- 商务部有关负责人就 2025 年版鼓励目录答记者问（商务部）
相关阅读
- 参见：2026 年外资准入负面清单：主要变化解读
- 参见：外资企业准入：审批与备案
- 参见：外商投资安全审查