China has imposed a moratorium on new foreign investment in film and TV production companies. The decision sets aside rules issued in 2004 that allowed foreigners to take minority stakes in local production companies.

Such a move would be a blow to foreign media companies that are eager to tap a Chinese market with 400 million increasingly affluent TV viewers and booming video sales.

Beijing has tightened curbs on foreign media involvement over the past two years, both to protect Chinese companies from competition and to maintain the communist government's control over what the public sees and hears.

Regulators also have restricted use of foreign programming on Chinese television. News Corp.'s Star TV and other competitors are allowed to be shown in luxury hotels, apartment compounds for foreigners and on cable systems in a small portion of the southern province of Guangdong.

Warner Bros., a unit of New York-based Time Warner Inc., said in November it was pulling out of its ventures to open cinemas in China due to changes in regulations.That followed a news report that the government had cut the 75 percent share that foreign investors had been allowed to own in cinema ventures to a minority stake.

In October, Viacom Inc.'s MTV Networks announced a venture with Chinese search engine Baidu.com to distribute programs over the Internet in an apparent effort to circumvent broadcast restrictions.

Source:佚名