australia-china free trade agreement conference brian pilbeam, pr

6The Chinese Government has set itself the objective of quadrupling China’s GDP by the middleof the century.Telecommunications are a vital ingredient for achieving such an economic objective.From 1997, with the advent of full deregulation, telecommunications had become the country’sfastest growing industry, and tracking by the Australian Bureau of Statistics shows the industrycontinues to grow and at an increasing rate. 1As a result, many foreign-owned carriers, including Chinese-owned telecoms companies, suchas Asia Netcom, are already very active in the Australian market.Supporting the ABS analysis, the Productivity Commission found this year Australia had thefourth highest ICT contribution to GDP in the second half of the 1990s. The commissionobserved Australia’s pro-competitive policies are of particular importance to the ability ofbusiness to realise the potential for ICT-related productivity gains.4. The FTA and telecommunicationsChina has already made some important steps along this pro-competition path. Itscommitments under its entry to the WTO are quite explicit.However, despite these important advances, our experience is that various barriers to entry,both explicit and more subtle bureaucratic hurdles, make any business case difficult.Telecommunications has its own special rules that are more onerous than those covering otherservice sectors, and quite apart from general foreign investment legislation in ChinaAs a result, most of the business opportunities Telstra has explored on the mainland haveultimately been frustrated by a combination of prohibitive regulatory and business factors thatapply to the telecommunications services market.1 From ABS 2001 Special Article: History of Telecommunications in Australia, updated 22/4/04- see at:http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/B6C38ACB7D28699CCA2569DE0028DE97?Open