The Chinese government was strongly advised by a senior corporate executive Saturday to learn from India to effectively develop outsourcing business.

"The government shall expand preferential tax policies on software firms to all outsourcing business so as to help develop an advantage based on low cost," said Zhang Chunjiang, a member of the 11th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), at a plenary meeting of its first annual full session.

In 2006 Indian firms took up 65 percent of the world's IT industry outsourcing market and 47 percent of office work outsourcing. The major reason was that Indian firms benefited greatly from governmental industrial strategy, especially free-of-tax policy, Zhang said.

Compared with foreign outsourcing companies including Indian ones, Chinese firms are lagged behind in service quality and the attraction of talented people, the political advisor said.

Training programs in line with international practice shall be introduced, Zhang said.

"The governments at various levels shall take the lead in outsourcing their services and encourage big domestic companies to do likewise," Zhang said, adding the country has unique advantages to boost outsourcing business.

China's high-quality and effective IT infrastructure network has laid a technical foundation for the business and the country has already attracted a number of multinationals, which could be potential clients, according to Zhang.

In the fast growing domestic IT service, technical personnel are trained and ready to join in the business, he said.

(Xinhua News Agency March 8, 2008)