CRI听力: Experts: Look before Investing Overseas

Over the past three decades, China has been recognized worldwide as an ideal place to invest. By the end of last year, China had used some 90 billion U.S. dollars of foreign direct investment, or FDI, ranking first among developing countries for sixteen consecutive years in terms of used FDI.

Ten years ago, China started promoting a "Go Out" strategy, encouraging enterprises to invest overseas. By the end of last year, Chinese companies had invested some 180 billion U.S. dollars in more than 170 countries and regions around the world.

Chen Yonglan, chief representative of Invest of Sweden, China, gives his view about how to bring Chinese overseas investment in line with global trends.

"We should shift from our traditional businesses, such as trade and OEM in overseas markets, to building up our own brands and eventually realizing a global operation of the company."

The ongoing global recession will undoubtedly be an important force driving Chinese companies to take a bigger share of the global market or acquire foreign companies. But the road is not always even.

Hu Yuandong is chief representative of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization's Investment and Technology Promotion Office for China. He points out some of the potential risks Chinese companies might face while investing overseas.

"There are some risky factors that we cannot ignore. For example, inflation, the target country's market, credit, exchange rates, and other risks within specific industries all contribute to risk. How to grasp investment opportunities while preventing and avoiding possible risks should be an urgent task for investors to solve."

He gives his suggestions on how to prevent and avoid such risks.

"First, investors should know all they can about themselves as well as the target markets. Second, investors should be fully prepared and ready to recognize risks. Third, investors should seek scientific management while preventing possible cooperation risk. Fourth, investors should strive to effectively integrate all their resources in order to avoid management risks."

He Fei, CRI news.