2001年12月11日，经历长达15年的“复关”和“入世”谈判，中国正式成为世界贸易组织（WTO）第143位成员。“入世”是中国经济社会发展和改革开放进程中具有里程碑式意义的重大事件，更是加速经济全球化进程、改写世界经济格局的重要转折点。

中国既是多边贸易体制受益方，更是多边贸易体制的最大贡献者。入世以来，中国经济与世界经济融合发展，对世界经济贡献度年均超过30%，成为促进世界经济发展的重要引擎，而中国也正走出一条从被动地“履约式开放”到主动地“规则和制度型开放”的道路。20年来，中国确立了以法律和规章为基础、透明和可预测、与WTO规则高度接轨的对外贸易新体制，按期或提前完成了入世时做出的承诺，并在WT0减让基础上进一步扩大开放。中国如期按入世承诺修改法律法规，建立起了符合WTO规则要求的经济贸易体制。

中国在关税政策、贸易便利性、开放程度以及法律法规等领域的改革成效显著。以入世签订的《中国加入议定书》和《中国加入工作组报告书》两个法律文本为标准，中国不仅完全履行而且超额完成入世承诺。在关税承诺和贸易便利化承诺方面，中国大幅削减进口环节制度性成本，关税总水平不断降低，货物关税水平由2001年的15.3%大幅下降至7.4%，远低于发展中国家平均关税水平（15%），农产品市场平均税率由23.2%降至15.2%，约为世界农产品平均关税的1/4，税率已接近发达国家、发达市场成员的对外开放水平。

在服务贸易领域，中国不断修改完善一系列进一步对外开放的法规和规章，服务贸易领域的承诺得到落实，市场准入大幅放宽。入世时，中国承诺开放9大类100个分部门，目前已在不同程度上开放到120多个部门，包括稳步扩大金融业开放，深化农业、采矿业、制造业开放，加快研发、电信、空运、教育、医疗、文化等领域开放进程，其开放程度已接近发达成员平均水平。

入世的20年是中国全面融入世界多边规则体系的20年，也是中国从被动的规则接受者转向主动的规则塑造者的20年。对内，中国积极推进国内规则、规制、标准等与国际对接。十八大以来中国围绕对接高标准国际规则出台了大量政策，包括调整规范产业补贴政策，清理外资企业和内资企业的差别待遇政策，深化政府采购改革。特别是面对新一轮全球规则竞争的压力，中国主动通过推进自由贸易试验区、自由贸易港建设，在扩大开放上迈出新步伐。例如，在海南自由贸易港加快探索实行外商投资准入负面清单与跨境服务贸易负面清单的一体化管理。

对外，中国积极发起和参与区域经贸协定谈判，为双边、区域经贸规则的形成和发展做出突出贡献。截至2021年11月，中国已签署21个自由贸易协定（含升级协定）。中国还积极参与完善国际经贸规则，与更多经济体签署高标准自由贸易协定，如积极推动签署《区域全面经济伙伴关系协定》（RCEP）和中欧全面投资协定，提出加入《全面与进步跨太平洋伙伴关系协定》（CPTPP）、《数字经济伙伴关系协定》（DEPA）等，凸显了中国以更大力度倒逼国内改革、全面扩大开放的坚定决心。

近年来，中国坚定维护以WTO为基石的多边贸易体制，践行真正的多边主义的责任与担当，不仅积极推动WTO改革，发布《关于世界贸易组织改革的立场文件》、《中国关于世贸组织改革的建议文件》等改革文件，还加快推动开放式诸边谈判。例如，作为主要推动方，中国牵头发起投资便利化的开放式诸边谈判，并在WTO收获广泛支持，为加强多边贸易体制贡献了中国方案。近期，中方还联合各方发起WTO下的服务贸易谈判，并最终与WTO的67个成员共同发表《关于完成服务贸易国内规制谈判的宣言》。新修订的服务减让表将按照最惠国待遇适用于所有WTO成员。

然而，在世界政经大变局背景下，新一轮WTO改革依然举步维艰，不仅现有决策机制未能解决发达成员与发展中成员之间不平等问题，作为WTO核心支柱之一的争端解决机制还由于美方持续阻挠上诉机构大法官遴选而陷于停摆，对多边贸易体制造成沉重打击。因此，如何让WTO谈判职能重新恢复活力，打破上诉机构停摆僵局，恢复争端解决机制正常运作已成当务之急。作为负责任的大国，中国不仅要从自身利益考虑，还要从更宏观视角去思考、设计和推动WTO机制改革，支持在特定议题下进一步开展诸边协定谈判，为多边贸易体制改革注入更加积极稳定的力量。

On Dec. 11, 2001, China officially became the 143rd member of the WTO after 15 years of negotiations to resume its status as a contracting party to GATT.China's WTO accession was a milestone in the country's economic and social development and its reform and opening-up process. It was an important turning point in accelerating the process of economic globalization and reshaping the global economic landscape.

China is both a beneficiary of the multilateral trading system and also its biggest contributor. Since joining the WTO, China has not only integrated with the global economy but has become an important driver of it. China has contributed more than 30 percent annually to global economic growth while blazing a path from passive compliance-based opening-up to active rules- and system-based opening-up.Over the past 20 years, China has established a new system of foreign trade based on laws and regulations that are transparent, predictable and highly compatible with the rules of the WTO. It has completed — on or ahead of schedule — the commitments it made upon WTO accession and has further expanded its opening-up. China has amended its laws and regulations as promised and established an economic and trading system compliant with WTO rules.

Its reforms in the areas of tariff policy, trade facilitation, openness and laws and regulations have been effective. Taking two legal texts as the standard — the Protocol on China's Accession to the WTO and the Report of the Working Party on the Accession of China to the WTO — China has not only fully fulfilled but also exceeded its accession commitments.In terms of tariff and trade facilitation commitments, it has significantly lowered the institutional costs of import links, and the overall level of tariffs has been steadily reduced. Tariffs on goods has dropped significantly from 15.3 percent in 2001 to 7.4 percent, far below the 15 percent average tariff level of developing countries. The average tariff rate in the agricultural market has been reduced from 23.2 percent to 15.2 percent, which is about one-fourth of the world average tariff on agricultural products, and is close to the level of developed countries and developed market members in opening up to the world.

In the area of trade in services, China has continuously revised and improved a series of rules and regulations to further open up. Its commitments in the area of trade in services have been implemented, and market access has been significantly relaxed. At the time of WTO accession, China promised to open up 100 sub-sectors in nine major categories, and has now opened up more than 120 subsectors to varying degrees.It is steadily expanding the opening-up of the financial sector, deepening the opening-up of agricultural, mining and manufacturing industries and accelerating the opening-up process in the fields of R&D, telecommunications, air transport, education, medicine and culture. Its opening-up has approached the average level of developed members.

In its 20 years of WTO membership, China fully integrated into the multilateral rule system globally and transformed from passively accepting rules to actively helping make rules. Internally, China has actively promoted the alignment with international norms of domestic rules, regulations and standards. Since the 18th National Party Congress, China has introduced a large number of policies aimed at alignment with high-standard international rules, including adjusting and standardizing industrial subsidy policies, cleaning up differential treatment policies for foreign and domestic enterprises and deepening government procurement reforms.It is of particular note that as it faced the pressure of a new round of global rules competition, China took the initiative to expand its openness by promoting the development of free trade pilot zones and free trade ports. For example, it has accelerated the exploration of integrated management with respect to the negative lists for foreign investment and cross-border services at its Hainan Free Trade Port.

Externally, China has actively initiated and participated in the negotiation of regional economic and trade agreements, making outstanding contributions to the formation and development of bilateral and regional economic and trade rules. As of November this year, China had signed 21 free trade agreements (including upgrade agreements) and actively participated in improving international economic and trade rules and signing high-standard free trade agreements with other economies. For example, it actively promoted the signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (RCEP) and the China-EU Comprehensive Investment Agreement and proposed to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP), the Digital Economy Partnership Agreement (DEPA) and other new initiatives. This highlights China's firm determination to push domestic reforms forward and expand its openness more vigorously.

In recent years, China has firmly upheld the multilateral trading system with the WTO as its cornerstone and practiced its responsibility and commitment to genuine multilateralism. Not only has China actively promoted WTO reform by issuing documents such as the Position Paper on WTO Reform and China's Proposal on WTO Reform, but has also accelerated open plurilateral negotiations. For example, as a major facilitator, China has taken the lead in initiating open plurilateral negotiations on investment facilitation and has gained wide support at the WTO, contributing Chinese approaches to strengthen the multilateral trading system.Recently, China also co-sponsored negotiations on trade in services under the WTO, which culminated in the Declaration on the Completion of Negotiations on Services Domestic Regulation with 67 WTO members. The newly revised schedule of service concessions will be applied to all WTO members in accordance with MFN treatment.

However, in the context of global political and economic changes, the new round of WTO reforms continues to struggle. Not only is the existing decision-making mechanism failing to address the inequality between developed and developing members but the dispute settlement mechanism, one of the core pillars of the WTO, has come to a standstill because of the continued obstruction of judge selection for the Appellate Body by the United States.This has dealt a heavy blow to the multilateral trading system. It is therefore imperative to revitalize the WTO negotiation function, break the deadlock of the Appellate Body and restore the normal operation of the dispute settlement mechanism.As a responsible power, China should not only consider its own interests but also consider the design and promote the reform of the WTO mechanism from a broader perspective. It should support further plurilateral agreement negotiations on specific issues and bring a more positive and stable force into the effort to reform the multilateral trading system.