The road ahead

While China's rapid advances have drawn global attention, the country has also been delivering "public goods" for the world, especially developing nations.

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the Belt and Road Initiative, both initiated by China, have expanded rapidly in funding and building connectivity from Asia to Europe and Africa.

In an article on Aug 10, Xinhua News Agency quoted WTO Director-General Roberto Azevedo as saying, "China is playing a more positive role in the multilateral trading system, taking globalization toward the direction of more inclusiveness and benefit for all."

Tu, the China Institute for WTO Studies president, said China has been generally good in honoring its WTO commitments, and he would give the country 80 marks out of 100 in this regard.

He believes China has done a great job in reducing tariffs and nontariff barriers, but has room to improve in further increasing the degree of marketization and reducing subsidies in the economy. He said China is now open to such discussions in its proposal for WTO reform.

Late last year, the country published a position paper on WTO reform. In its proposal submitted to the organization in May, China said it has been an active participant, staunch supporter and major contributor to the multilateral trading system. It supports necessary reform of the WTO to enable the organization to "overcome its existential crisis".

Lamy said part of the problem is that WTO rules are relatively weak in some areas and must be strengthened. He also believes the WTO reform agenda must first focus on subsidies and resolving the issue of the appellate body.

He was not only referring to subsidies to State-owned enterprises, but also US agricultural subsidies.

The US has been blocking the appointment and reappointment of judges to the WTO appellate body, threatening the function of the dispute settlement mechanism. To tackle this, last month the European Union and Canada proposed an interim appeal arbitration arrangement based on existing WTO rules.

Lamy said he is concerned that US President Donald Trump has damaged the multilateral system and the global economy. But he said the European Union's strategy is to "keep the US in the tent and bring China more into the tent".