Businesses in the West were gearing up last night for a huge export drive to China after six days of talks between Beijing and Washington paved the way for the full opening up of the world's largest potential consumer market.
China's leaders agreed to a package of trade liberalisation measures that will provide new opportunities for the West's banks, insurers, farmers, Internet companies and film makers.
Beijing's concessions - which will cement the 20-year transition from communism to a market economy - were enough to win United States support for China's membership of the World Trade Organisation, the Geneva-based body which polices the global trading system.
The accord ends 13 years of often difficult negotiations and is seen as setting the seal on China's transformation into a fully-fledged, free-market economy. It has raised hopes of a fresh influx of foreign investment, which had been declining.
Access to China's 1.2 billion consumers could boost western exports by $21 billion a year, according to the institute of international economics in Washington.
Those sectors likely to benefit most will be hi-tech companies, Wall Street, telecommunications firms and farmers, who will be able to get access to China's heavily-protected agricultural market.
Mr Mike Moore, the WTO's director-general, a former New Zealand prime minister, said: "An historic door has been opened. Now we all have to walk through that door together." But before China could become a member a number of other countries would have to finalise their discussions with Beijing, and there were other entry procedures to be completed.
The European Union responded cautiously to the news, saying that it would expect "equivalent" terms for EU firms from China before Brussels could support Beijing's membership.
The EU said yesterday that the US-China agreement was an important step but China must still satisfy EU trade concerns.
The EU is now the most important world trading power with which the Chinese must wrap up bilateral negotiations before it can join the WTO. Beijing must also reach market-opening agreements with Canada and other members.
"The fact that the United States and China have concluded a deal is an important step," a European Commission spokesman, Mr Anthony Gooch, said.
"However, for China to enter the WTO, equivalent deals with Europe and with Canada would have to be finalised," he said. China would also have to complete a multilateral process in Geneva where all WTO members had a right to comment, he said.
Mr Gooch's stress on the word "equivalent" means that the EU will insist on being given the same concessions that China has granted to the United States and will expect China to negotiate on sectors of special interest to Europe.
The German Finance Minister, Mr Hans Eichel, said Germany, the EU's biggest economy, backed China's WTO entry.
Detailed negotiations between the EU and China resumed last month after they were frozen in May following NATO's bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade during the alliance's air campaign against Yugoslavia.
But, after three days of talks in Geneva in late October, an EU trade official, Mr Karl Falkenberg, said China's offers on opening up key industries still fell short of what the EU wanted.
Senior trade diplomats said that the breakthrough with Washington was crucial, since it was unlikely that any other country or trading bloc could negotiate more favourable terms.
The US administration has been under strong pressure from corporations, such as the mobile phone maker, Motorola, and aircraft maker, Boeing, to bring China into the WTO, despite concern over Beijing's human rights record.
Beijing's case was strengthened by its decision last year not to devalue its currency, thereby supporting the devastated economies of east Asia during the financial turmoil. China's trade balance fell by 60 per cent in the first five months of 1999 because its exports became more expensive.
The breakthrough provides a much-needed boost to the WTO, which has been under attack from a coalition of lobby groups and anti-free trade protesters.