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China has started rolling out its new fast-track, long-stay visas for “high-end talent”, documents meant to encourage specialists such as top scientists and businesspeople to live and work in China.
The roll-out began on Tuesday with the Beijing bureau of the State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs issuing the country’s first Certificate for Foreign High-end Talent.
The certificate is necessary to apply for one of the new five- or 10-year multiple-entry visas. The report said the visas took as little as one day to process, were free and were valid for stays of 180 days.
The visas would also be granted to the spouses and children of the “high-end” recipients.
China implements a strict immigration system and tightly controls the issuing of work visas. Most foreigners working in China must renew their visas every one or two years.
The new visas are meant to expand the pool of foreign specialists working in China, particularly in the areas such as science and technology, which Beijing sees as key to driving economic growth.
According to government guidelines, high-end foreigners also refer to, among others, Nobel Prize winners, chief or deputy editors in Chinese state media, foreign coaches and players in national and provincial sports teams, postdoctoral students from world-class universities outside China, and foreigners who earn at least six times the average annual wage in China.
The average annual income in Beijing in 2016 was 92,477rmb. The visas are part of a top-down drive to make China a more attractive place to work and stay.
In February 2016, the central government relaxed the country’s green card rules, extending eligibility for permanent residency to foreigners working in broader fields than just government departments or laboratories involved in “key national projects”.
Of all the provincial-level areas in China, Shanghai has the highest number of foreign workers, with about 215,000 of the city’s 24 million people coming from overseas. A third of those overseas workers are employed in the business service sector.
In 2016, Japan was the biggest source of foreign workers in Shanghai, followed by the United States and South Korea.
外国人才来华有变化：“零费用”申请10年签证
中国为“高端人才”推出快速发放长期逗留新签证，用以鼓励专业人才前往中国生活和工作，比如顶尖科学家和商业专家。新政始于2018年1月2日，国家外国专家局北京分局发放了中国首份《外国高端人才确认函》。
人才确认函是申请5年或10年多次入境签证的必备文件。
这类签证最快只要一天就能办好，免费，每次可停留180天。 另外，这类签证也向“高端人才”的配偶及未成年子女发放。
中国实行严格的移民制度，发放工作签证方面控制得非常严格。 大多数在华工作的外国人必须每年或每两年重新签证一次。新的签证是为了扩大在华工作的外国专家人才，特别是科技领域的人才。北京认为科技是推动经济增长的重要力量。
按照指导方针，外国高端人才还包括媒体正副主编、国家队或省队的外国教练和运动员、来自国外世界一流大学的博士后学生以及收入至少为中国平均年薪六倍的外国人。
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