The Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) will enjoy better access into the Chinese mainland market in various sectors as the two places Friday signed a new supplement to an existing trade agreement.

The Supplement VII to the Mainland and Macao Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement (CEPA), an FTA-like arrangement, was signed by China's Vice Minister of Commerce, Jiang Zengwei, and Secretary for Economy and Finance of Macao SAR, Tam Pak Yuen, at the SAR's Government Headquarter.

The new supplement, which will become effective next year, mainly comprises new measures concerning the trade and investment facilitation and trade in services.

According to the agreement, the mainland authorities will expand the areas of trade and investment facilitation measures to the education sector, bringing the total number of such sectors to 10, with up to five industry cooperation programs.

As for trade in services, further liberalization will be implemented in mainland's 11 service sectors such as construction, health, banking, tourism, social service, etc, while adding two new sectors, including technical testing and analysis and inspection of goods, to the list. So far the number of areas of mainland's service market liberalization toward Macao has expanded to 43.

The new measures included in the latest supplement continuously increased the number of areas and deepened the contents of liberalization in mainland's service industry, said Jiang Zengwei, at a press conference after the signing ceremony.

He also highlighted the health sector, saying the new measures will allow Macao service providers to invest and operate hospitals with sole-proprietorship in China's two municipalities, Shanghai and Chongqing, and three provinces, namely Guangdong, Fujian and Hainan.

Since the CEPA between Macao and the mainland came into effect in 2004, the mainland authorities have progressively expand its contents by respectively signing seven supplements in the following years.

By the end of 2009, Macao enterprises and residents have established over 700 companies and privately-owned small business on the mainland under the CEPA mechanism, and the SAR has recorded nearly 34 million mainland visitors under the Individual Travel Scheme, a CEPA measure, as the scheme was extended to 49 mainland cities, the figures indicated.

The implementation of CEPA has brought sufficient benefits to the market liberalization and cooperation between the two places, and the SAR government will work with the mainland authorities to better implement the new measures that were included in the supplements, so that the trade agreements can benefit the local communities, said Tam.