With business leaders from around the globe practically falling over themselves to prove as much at the event, few dared argue.

Figures released just a few days earlier also suggested it was no idle boast. Foreign direct investment in China in the first eight months of 2011 totalled $77.63bn (£48.19bn) , an increase of 17.7 per cent on the same period in 2010. In August alone, according to the Ministry of Commerce, investment from overseas amounted to $8.45bn, an 11.1 per cent improvement on the previous year.

That foreign direct investment (FDI) has been crucial to China’s extraordinary economic rise is beyond dispute. The government has consistently implemented policies designed to attract more FDI, and premier Wen Jiabao was quick to use the latest statistics to restate a commitment to promoting growth through the continued opening of the Chinese economy to overseas investors.

The rationale for increased efforts to appeal to foreign firms often stems from the belief that, in addition to the direct capital inflows and employment that accompany it, FDI generates positive externalities in the form of productivity gains, technology transfers, the introduction of new processes, managerial skills and know-how, employee training, international production networks and access to other markets. These ‘spillovers’, as they are known, are not automatic and might occur through various channels such asimitation, skills acquisition, competition and exports.

Yet the doubts surrounding the Dragon’s ability to sustain its meteoric ascent through the relentless courtship of FDI persist. One common criticism is that domestic conditions, particularly the nature of local financial markets, may limit Chinese firms’ capacity to maximise FDI’s benefits.

It is universally recognised, for example, that China’s state-owned enterprises (SOEs) enjoy substantial financial backing in terms of loans and grants from state-owned banks. Until 1998, when the constitution was changed, these banks were instructed to lend exclusively to SOEs, and even now they deem private businesses riskier.

In 2003 a World Bank investment climate survey concluded Chinese firms had much less access to formal finance than firms in any other Asian country examined at that point. Companies with more than 100 employees obtained approximately 29 per cent of their working capital from bank loans, less than in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand or Korea. Firms with fewer than 100 employees obtained only 12 per cent of their working capital from bank loans, compared with, for instance, Malaysia’s 21 per cent and the Philippines’ 28 per cent. In other words, many Chinese firms face credit constraints entirely unrelated to the probability of their eventual success.