Citing an unidentified official at the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, Xinhua news agency said the provisional rules on these payments which had already gone into effect would not be too onerous.

“Chinese companies operating abroad ... are required to join up to and pay into social security in the countries they are based in, and this has not affected the investment of these companies overseas,” the official told Xinhua.

Now that all companies in China would have pay into social security for all their employees, no company would have an unfair competitive advantage of spending less to employ foreigners, the report said.

“All firms ought to fulfill their obligations by paying social security, and this is not an extra burden,” it added.

Foreign executives in China have complained that the scheme will increase costs already on the rise in the world’s second largest economy, and that the plan is too vague and will be hard for companies to implement.

Xinhua said China was following international commitments with the rules incorporating foreigners into its social security net.

“It is a demand for following international treaties and respecting international norms,” it added. “It is to protect the social security rights of foreign employees.”

Xinhua said more than 230,000 foreigners had Chinese work permits as of the end of last year.

The efforts to include foreigners in the nationwide scheme will make it more like policies in many EU countries, where citizens and foreigners alike pay into the system.

The government has been taking a step-by-step approach in providing social security benefits to the country’s 1.34 billion people, hesitant to over commit to a system that could drain the government’s coffers.

China’s existing social security net offers very meagre protection for its own citizens, especially compared with some of the more generous schemes in Europe, and it is far from clear what exactly foreigners will be eligible for in China.

Xinhua did not elaborate on how or if foreigners would be able to access such services as unemployment benefit, though that seems unlikely as work visas are tied to jobs and invalidated in the event of being laid off.

Foreigners who “meet the conditions ... will get the same treatment as Chinese when it comes to social security,” it said.

The tax could be up to 11 percent of salaries, Hong Kong media has reported.

However, expatriates from countries that have bilateral tax exemption agreements with China, such as Japan and France, may not need to pay the social security tax, Xinhua suggested.

“We have a positive attitude toward this, and are preparing to have talks with relevant countries ... to appropriately resolve the issue of double payment,” it added.