China would promote the orderly opening of some services, including in the fields of finance, education, culture and healthcare to investment by foreign firms, China’s Minister of Commerce, Gao Hucheng, was reported as saying at the 4th China Beijing International Fair for Trade in Services, an event known as CIFTIS.

China would lift restrictions on foreign investment for a range of service industry sectors, including childcare and care of the elderly, architecture design, accounting and auditing, and logistics and e-commerce, Mr Gao said, as quoted by Chinese-language newspaper the Hong Kong Economic Journal.

China’s trade in services would exceed US$1 trillion by 2020 the minister said. He added that service providers from all over the world were being presented with an important opportunity for co-operation in China’s huge market.

Mr Gao has previously said the value of China’s services sector was expected to exceed US$750 billion this year.

Last year, the value of the sector grew by 14.6 percent year-on-year to US$713 billion, meaning the Asian nation the country ranked second in the world for the value of its market in services, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported.