Date：2025-11-19Views：0
The world economy thrives when it is open and declines when it is closed. Over the past decade, the average growth rate of global trade in services has been twice that of trade in goods, with its share and position in international trade steadily increasing. The World Trade Organization predicts that the proportion of trade in services will continue to rise, from the current 22% to over 33% by 2040. In December 2021, 67 countries, including China, signed the Agreement on Trade in Services under the coordination of the World Trade Organization. This is the first time since 2015 that the World Trade Organization has reached an agreement on new global trade rules. This agreement will reduce the cost of global trade in services by $150 billion annually. It is evident that despite various challenges, trade in services remains a focal point for countries and an important force driving development. The historical trend of peace, development, cooperation, and win-win cooperation is unstoppable, pushing economic globalization forward. Promoting open cooperation in the service industry is the general trend and the will of the people.
Service trade is not only related to trade, but also to the driving force of economic growth and the level of high-quality development around the world. Studies show that the cost of international service trade is currently about twice that of cross-border goods trade and four times that of domestic service trade. The main barriers to the opening up of the service industry are restrictive measures imposed on foreign service providers in the domestic market, and market access restrictions such as quotas set by regulatory authorities in approval processes. Due to its characteristics of light assets and soft factors, the service industry needs an open, transparent, and inclusive industry development ecosystem even more. The more important the economic and trade cooperation is, the more important it is to establish fair, transparent, open, and inclusive trade rules. The facilitation of service trade still has a long way to go.
The World Trade Organization has made trade in services a key negotiation content for many years, and regional cooperation agreements such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) have also included trade in services as a major provision, taking continuous actions to promote the liberalization and facilitation of trade in services.
The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which has already taken effect, is an international agreement based on and aiming for zero tariffs. The 15 member countries of RCEP account for one-third of the world's total economy, trade volume, and population, making it the largest free trade area globally. Not only will there be a comprehensive implementation of zero tariffs on imports of goods trade, but there will also be firm commitments made in the area of service trade. Specifically, five years after the agreement takes effect (January 1, 2027), the opening of service trade will be subject to negative list management. Taking China as an example, it is equivalent to a commitment to add 22 sectors such as research and development, management consulting, manufacturing-related services, and air transportation to the approximately 100 sectors promised in China's WTO accession commitments, and to enhance the commitment level of 37 sectors such as finance, law, construction, and maritime transportation. Demand for services related to production such as research and development and design, demand for services related to goods trade such as logistics and finance, and demand for services related to population mobility such as tourism and education will continue to rise, and new forms and models of service trade will be better activated.
Regarding the CPTPP, in terms of the number of open sectors, except for Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar, all other members have committed to opening over 100 service sectors. China has committed to opening 122 sectors, while ASEAN as a whole has committed to opening 100 sectors. The number of open sectors for service trade in the CPTPP is higher than that in the RCEP.
The Digital Economy Partnership Agreement (DEPA) is the first international agreement specifically targeting cooperation in the digital economy and digital trade. It covers aspects such as business and trade facilitation, data issues, digital identity, innovation, and the digital economy, aiming to strengthen digital trade cooperation among parties and establish relevant norms.
While global trade in services is moving towards openness and cooperation, it also faces some challenges: the United States and some Western countries are accelerating their efforts to seize the discourse power in the new round of global economic and trade system, promoting their rules through bilateral, regional, and plurilateral agreements, with a trend of mutual alignment. Some countries are attempting to marginalize developing countries through legislation. Trade in services is closely related to the level of economic development of various countries. We must be vigilant of the potential negative effects, such as the widening digital divide, imbalances in trade in services, and impacts on small and medium-sized enterprises, which could affect inclusive global economic growth.
In addition, the issue of data flow security cannot be ignored. The prosperity of digital trade is inseparable from the safe and orderly flow of data. In recent years, incidents such as illegal data leakage and abuse, hacker attacks, and intrusions into data systems have occurred frequently, involving various data subjects' rights and interests such as national security, public interests, commercial interests, and individual citizens, leading to an increasing number of security risks and regulatory challenges. With the advancement of the digital economy and digital trade, the global data volume has grown exponentially, with China experiencing the fastest growth rate. It is expected that by 2025, China will account for 27.8% of the global total, becoming the region with the largest data capacity in the world. As China gradually becomes a global data center, coupled with the diversity of data resources, there is a need for both open sharing and security controllability. This has raised higher requirements for improving mechanisms such as data privacy protection, risk assessment, security review, data traceability, monitoring and early warning, and emergency response.
