- China’s nationwide foreign investment negative list stands at 29 items in 2026, its shortest version ever, after manufacturing restrictions were fully removed.
中国2026年全国版外商投资准入负面清单已缩减至29条，为史上最短版本，制造业限制措施已全面取消。- The negative-list-plus-pre-establishment-national-treatment regime remains the default gateway for every foreign investor entering the Chinese market.
“准入前国民待遇加负面清单”管理制度仍是每一位进入中国市场的外国投资者的默认准入通道。- All manufacturing sub-sectors are now open to foreign capital with no equity-ratio caps, marking a complete “zeroing-out” of manufacturing access limits.
制造业所有细分领域均已向外开开放且不再设股比上限，标志着制造业准入限制全面”清零”。- Sensitive sectors including news, publishing, culture, education, certain telecom and mining activities stay restricted or prohibited and require careful screening.
新闻、出版、文化、教育以及部分电信、采矿等敏感行业仍受限制或禁止，需要仔细筛查。- The 2024 edition (NDRC & MOFCOM Order No. 23) is the operative list in force through 2026, with further trimming signalled under the 15th Five-Year Plan.
2024年版（国���发展改革委、商务部第23号令）是2026年仍在施行的有效清单，十五五规划已明确提出进一步缩减。- Foreign investors should still screen business-scope keywords against the list, because post-access operating permits affect listing and M&A outcomes.
外资仍须就经营范围关键词与清单进行筛查，因为准入后的经营许可会影响上市与并购结果。
China’s 2026 Foreign Investment Negative List: Structure, Scope and Market-Entry Implications | 中国2026年外商投���准入负面清单：结构、范围与准入影响
What the Negative List Is and Why It Matters
Since the Foreign Investment Law took effect on 1 January 2020, China has managed inbound investment through a single organising principle: pre-establishment national treatment plus a negative list. Under this regime, any sector that does not appear on the negative list is open to foreign investors on the same terms as domestic firms, and no case-by-case approval is required. The list, in effect, is the “no-go” map: it tells a foreign shareholder exactly where ownership caps, joint-venture requirements, or outright prohibitions still apply. For a market-entry advisor, the negative list is the first document to open before any deal structure, ownership percentage, or legal vehicle is drawn. It determines whether a wholly foreign-owned enterprise is even permissible, whether a Chinese partner is mandatory, and whether a sector regulator’s pre-establishment licence must be secured before the business licence is issued.
The 2024 Edition: 29 Items and a Historic Low
The current operative list is the *Special Administrative Measures for Foreign Investment Access (Negative List) (2024 Edition)*, issued by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) as Order No. 23 and effective from 1 November 2024. It cut the nationwide list from 31 items to 29 — the shortest in the instrument’s history. The reduction is not merely cosmetic: it removed the last two manufacturing restrictions, a point we return to below. Measured against the early lists first trialled in the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone in 2013, the national list has fallen by more than half, a trajectory the State Council has repeatedly described as “opening the door wider.” The table below tracks the national list’s contraction over recent editions.
| Edition | National items | Headline move |
|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 63 | Baseline national list |
| 2020 | 33 | Nuclear, finance liberalisation begins |
| 2021 | 31 | Mining, rail equipment opened |
| 2024 | 29 | Manufacturing fully opened (“zeroed out”) |
Manufacturing “Zeroed Out”
The headline change of the 2024 list is the complete removal of manufacturing access limits. The two deleted items were: (1) a requirement that publication printing be controlled by the Chinese party; and (2) a prohibition on the application of certain traditional Chinese medicine processing techniques (steaming, stir-frying, calcining) and the production of pharmaceuticals based on confidential formulae. With these gone, every manufacturing sub-sector — from automobiles and semiconductors to pharmaceuticals and food — is now open to foreign investors at 100% ownership. NDRC officials confirmed in March 2026 that “manufacturing access restrictions have been fully zeroed out,” and MOFCOM has since framed the policy challenge as shifting from “access” (准入) to “operating permission” (准营) — solving the “big door open, small door closed” problem. In other words, the binding constraint for manufacturers is no longer equity but the operating licence, product registration, and standards compliance that follow.
What Remains Restricted
Despite the manufacturing opening, several strategically sensitive areas remain on the list:
- News and publishing: foreign investment is prohibited in internet news-information services, online publishing, and broadcast-television programme production; film and television production must be Chinese-controlled.
- Culture: certain cultural-operation restrictions persist, including limits on Chinese-foreign cooperative operation of performance venues and internet culture operations.
- Education: compulsory, high-school and higher-education institutions are limited to Chinese-foreign cooperative forms with Chinese dominance; the principal or chief administrative officer must be a Chinese citizen.
- Telecom: basic telecom services must be Chinese-controlled; for value-added telecom, foreign equity is generally capped at 50% (with carve-outs for e-commerce, domestic multi-party communication, store-and-forward, and call centres).
- Mining and agriculture: exploration of rare and unique Chinese crop varieties is prohibited; wheat and corn new-variety breeding must be Chinese-controlled.
These carve-outs are deliberate: the negative list is a national-security as well as an openness instrument, and the 15th Five-Year Plan reaffirms “coordinating opening up and security.”
Negative List vs. the Encouraged Catalogue
The negative list is only half the market-access picture. Sectors that are off the list but appear on the *Catalogue of Encouraged Industries for Foreign Investment* enjoy concrete incentives — tariff exemptions on imported equipment, preferential land use, and in some cases tax benefits. The 2025 edition of that catalogue (NDRC & MOFCOM Order No. 37, effective 1 February 2026) expanded to 1,679 entries, a net increase of 205 over the 2022 version, steering foreign capital toward advanced manufacturing, modern services, high-tech, and energy conservation. A market entrant should therefore screen twice: first against the negative list to confirm access is permitted, then against the encouraged catalogue to capture available incentives.
How the Regime Works in Practice
A foreign-invested enterprise (FIE) is still registered through the standard company set-up, but its business scope must be checked against the list. Increasingly, provincial “one-network” platforms generate an access pre-check report automatically: an investor inputs its intended industry code and the system flags whether a pre-establishment licence from a sector regulator (for example, the cultural, education, or health authority) is required. Crucially, the screening now reaches beyond actual operations to the wording of the business-scope description. A licence that merely contains sensitive keywords — “advertising release,” “human stem cells,” “gene diagnosis,” “internet data service” — can trigger scrutiny even if the activity is never carried out, and can affect later overseas listing or equity transfer. Advisors therefore counsel clients to strip non-essential sensitive wording at registration.
What to Watch in 2026 and Beyond
The 2026 Government Work Report and the 15th Five-Year Plan outline both state plainly that the negative list will be further trimmed, with services as the priority. The June 2026 *Action Plan for Stabilizing and Optimizing Foreign Investment* (covered in our separate articles) commits to a “timely reduction” of the negative list and to the orderly opening of telecom, internet, education, culture, and healthcare. The cross-border services-trade negative list is also to be compressed. Practically, foreign investors should expect steady, sector-by-sector liberalisation rather than a single blockbuster revision, with free-trade zones and the Hainan Free Trade Port acting as the testing ground before national rollout.
Practical Steps for Market Entry
- Screen first. Map your intended business scope to the 2024 national list, and, if entering a pilot zone, to the FTZ list as well.
- Choose the right vehicle. With manufacturing fully open, a wholly foreign-owned enterprise is generally available; for restricted sectors, plan for a joint venture or cooperative structure.
- Clean the scope. Avoid sensitive keywords that are not genuinely needed to reduce downstream friction.
- Secure pre-establishment licences early where a sector regulator’s approval is required before the business licence.
- Check the encouraged catalogue to capture tariff, land, and tax incentives.
- Monitor 2026 revisions and pilot-zone expansions that may lift a current restriction.
The negative list is no longer the sharpest constraint on foreign manufacturing investment in China; for most sectors it is simply the first checkbox on a longer operating-permit journey.
中国2026年外商投资准入负面清单：结构、范围与准入影响
负面清单是什么，为何重要
自《外商投资法》于2020年1月1日施行以来，中国通过一条核心原则管理 inbound 投资：准入前国民待遇加负面清单。在这一制度下，凡未列入负面清单的领域，外资均按与内资同等条件开放，无需逐案审批。负面清单实质上是一张”禁区地图”：它明确告诉外国股东，在哪些领域仍适用股比上限、合资要求或 outright 禁止。对市场准入顾问而言，负面清单是绘制任何交易结构、持股比例或法律载体之前首先要打开的文件。它决定了外商独资企业是否可行、是否必须找中国伙伴、以及在营业执照签发前是否需取得行业主管部门的准入许可。
2024年版：29条，史上最短
当前施行的清单是《外商投资准入特别管理措施（负面清单）（2024年版）》，由国家发展改革委、商务部以第23号令发布，自2024年11月1日起施行。它将全国版清单由31条减至29条，为该制度设立以来最短。这一缩减并非表面文章：它删除了最后两项制造业限制，下文详述。回溯2013年上海自贸试验区首次试点的早期清单，全国版清单已缩减逾半，国务院多次将此描述为”大门越开越大”。下表列出近年来全国版清单的收缩轨迹。
| 版本 | 全国条目 | 标志性动作 |
|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 63 | 全国版基准清单 |
| 2020 | 33 | 核电开放，金融业开放起步 |
| 2021 | 31 | 采矿、轨道交通设备开放 |
| 2024 | 29 | 制造业全面放开（”清零”） |
制造业”清零”
2024年版最引人注目的变化是制造业准入限制的全面取消。被删除的两项是：（1）出版物印刷须由中方控股；（2）禁止投资中药饮片蒸、炒、炙、煅等炮制技术的应用及中成药保密处方产品的生产。这两项取消后，制造业所有细分领域——从汽车、半导体到医药、食品——均向外开开放，可100%持股。国家发展改革委在2026年3月确认”制造业领域外资准入限制全面清零”，商务部此后将政策重心定义为从”准入”转向”准营”——解决”大门开、小门不开”的问题。换言之，对制造商而言，约束性限制已不再是股权，而是随之而来的经营许可证、产品注册与标准合规。
仍受限制的领域
尽管制造业放开，若干战略敏感领域仍列于清单之上：
- 新闻与出版： 禁止外商投资互联网新闻信息服务、网络出版、广播电视节目制作；影视制作须由中方控股。
- 文化： 部分文化经营限制保留，包括对外商中外合作经营演出场所、网络文化经营的限制。
- 教育： 义务教育、普通高中及高等教育机构限于中外合作办学且由中方主导，校长或主要行政负责人须为中国公民。
- 电信： 基础电信业务须由中方控股；增值电信外资股比一般不得超过50%（电子商务、国内多方通信、存储转发、呼叫中心除外）。
- 采矿与农业： 禁止投资中国稀有和特有优良品种繁育；小麦、玉米新品种选育须由中方控股。
这些保留是刻意的：负面清单既是开放工具，也是国家安全工具，十五五规划重申”统筹开放与安全”。
负面清单与鼓励目录
负面清单只是准入图景的一半。未列入清单、但列入《鼓励外商投资产业目录》的领域可享具体优惠——进口设备关税减免、用地优惠，以及部分税收优惠。该目录2025年版（国家发展改革委、商务部第37号令，2026年2月1日施行）扩至1,679条，较2022年版净增205条，引导外资投向先进制造业、现代服务业、高新技术与节能环保。因此，市场进入者须做两次筛查：先对照负面清单确认准入允许，再对照鼓励目录获取可用激励。
制度如何实际运行
外商投资企业仍通过标准设立流程注册，但其经营范围须与清单核对。越来越多省份的”一网通办”平台自动生成准入预检报告：投资者输入拟从事行业代码，系统即提示是否需行业主管部门（如文化、教育、卫生部门）的准入前许可。关键在于，筛查已从实际业务延伸至经营范围表述本身。执照中仅含敏感关键词——”广告发布””人体干细胞””基因诊断””互联网数据服务”——即便从不实际开展，也可能触发审查，并影响日后境外上市或股权转让。因此顾问建议客户在注册时剔除非必要的敏感表述。
2026年及之后的看点
2026年《政府工作报告》与十五五规划《纲要》均明确，负面清单将进一步缩减，并以服务业为重点。2026年6月的《利用外资固稳促优行动方案》（见本系列其他文章）承诺”适时缩减”负面清单，并有序扩大电信、互联网、教育、文化、医疗开放。跨境服务贸易负面清单也将压缩。实践中，外资应预期的是稳步的、分行业的开放，而非一次性大幅修订，自贸试验区与海南自由贸易港将先行先试，再向全国推广。
市场准入的实操步骤
- 先行筛查。 将拟从事经营范围对照2024年全国版清单，若进入试点区域还需对照自贸试验区版清单。
- 选对载体。 制造业全面放开，一般可设外商独资企业；受限行业则须规划合资或合作结构。
- 清理表述。 剔除非必要的敏感关键词，降低后续摩擦。
- 尽早取得准入前许可。 凡需行业主管部门批准者，应在营业执照前完成。
- 核对鼓励目录 以享受关税、用地与税收优惠。
- 关注2026年修订 及试点区域扩容，可能解除当前某项限制。
负面清单已不再是外资制造业投资在中国最尖锐的约束；对多数行业而言，它只是更长”准营”旅程上的第一个勾选项。
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