Wu Yi Profile

State Councilor, State Council, PRC

Alternate Member, Political Bureau of the Fifteenth CCP Central Committee

Ms. Wu Yi, "China’s Iron Lady", earned a reputation as a tough but flexible negotiator while minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation through the deals she orchestrated with the United States on copyright protection, trade and investment agreements. In 1993, when trade frictions with the United States were at a peak, Wu impressed the party brass with her handling of talks with Mickey Kantor and Charlene Barshefsky.

Because of her toughness, intelligence and dedication to her work, as well as her close ties to Premier Zhu Rongji, she was promoted to the post of state councilor, the highest government rank below vice premier, and is now the most powerful woman in the government. Zhu put her in charge of foreign trade, in which capacity she has been overseeing sensitive negotiations for China’s accession to the World Trade Organization.

Wu’s portfolio also includes Industry and State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs), although Zhu has reserved for himself the policy-making for SOE reform, much to Wu’s disappointment.

Wu is associated with current government efforts to promote the development of China’s hinterland via increased foreign trade and economic cooperation; to expand China’s cooperation with the World Intellectual Property Organization; to promote the growth of high tech exports and attract foreign direct investment through policies and laws more favorable to foreign investors; and to encourage Chinese firms to invest in overseas assembly plants. She is responsible for hammering out five trade agreements with Russia in February 1999, and is helping to outline a framework to improve the living conditions of women and children for the first 10 years of the next century.

Leadership Posts

Wu Yi, a thirty-year veteran of the petroleum industry, was elected vice mayor of Beijing in 1988, overseeing the city’s foreign trade and industrial development. She left the post in 1991 to become the vice minister of Foreign Economic Relations and Trade, rising to minister of the former Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation, where she exercised her negotiating skill until 1998 when she became one of China’s five state councilors. Meanwhile, in 1992, Wu was elected president of the China Association of Foreign-Funded Enterprises.

Wu is a rising star in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) apparatus. She served as Party secretary of the Beijing Yanshan Petrochemical Corporation from 1983 to 1988. In 1987 she became an alternate member of the Thirteenth CCP Central Committee, China’s ruling elite, becoming a full member of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth CCP Central Committees in 1992 and 1997. The latter year, her political influence was marked by her selection to alternate membership in the 22-member Politburo of the CCP Central Committee. She is a member of the 16th CPC Central Committee and of its Political Bureau.

Background

Born into an intellectual family in 1938 in the city of Wuhan, Hubei Province, Wu Yi attended Beijing Petroleum College. Upon graduation in 1962, she worked in the Lanzhou Oil Refinery in Gansu Province. Following this, from 1965 to 1967, she worked in the Technology Department of the Ministry of Petroleum Industry. She served successively as a technician, technology section chief, deputy chief engineer and deputy director of the Beijing Dongfanghong Refinery from 1967 to 1983. She became deputy manager of the Beijing Yanshan Petrochemical Corporation in 1983, where she remained until 1988.

Much gossip has surrounded her unmarried status and the high-profile suitors for her hand. Says she: "I'm not committed to celibacy." In her youth, she had an ideal image of a man, she says, but he "doesn't exist in real life." She had wanted to establish a career before starting a family. "I spent 20 years in the backwoods. When I got out, I was already too old. Plus work was hectic. So I gave up."

Wu never envisioned a life in politics. "In my youth, I never developed a desire to enter politics. My biggest wish was to become a great entrepreneur." It would still be her preference if given the choice now. "In an enterprise, you can develop your own thinking."

1956-1962 Studied at the National Defense Department of the Northwest Polytechnic Institute and the Oil Refinery Department of the Beijing Petroleum Institute majoring in oil refinery engineering

1962-1965 Technician of a workshop and staff member of the Political Department of the Lanzhou Oil Refinery

1965-1967 Technician of the production division, Production and Technology Department of the Ministry of Petroleum Industry

1967-1983 Technician, deputy chief and chief of the technology section, deputy chief engineer and deputy director of the Beijing Dongfanghong Refinery

1983-1988 Deputy general manager and Party secretary of the Yanshan Petrochemical Corporation

1988-1991 Vice-mayor of Beijing

1991-1993 Vice-minister of Foreign Economic Relations and Trade, Deputy secretary of the ministry's Leading Party Members' Group

1993-1997 Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation and secretary of the Ministry's Leading Party Members' Group

1997-1998 Alternate member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation and secretary of the Ministry's Leading Party Members' Group

1998-2002 Alternate member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, State Councilor and member of the Leading Party Members' Group of the State Council

2002- Member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, State Councilor and member of the Leading Party Members' Group of the State Council.

26 April 2003 - Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) appointed Vice-Minister Wu Yi as China's new Health Minister.

UPDATED: 3 July 2003

http://www.chinaonline.com/refer/biographies/secure/BB-REV-WuYi3.asp
http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/data/people/wuyi.shtml