The government of the Tibet Autonomous Region welcomes foreign investment in energy, transportation, construction, textiles and other light industry, electromechanics, commerce, foodstuffs, aquaculture, processing, tourism and in the development of agriculture, forestry and animal husbandry. Foreign investors may establish wholly foreign-owned enterprises and joint ventures or join in economic and technological cooperation. Medium- and long-term investment projects and high-yield development projects are particularly welcome. The regional government also encourages individual entrepreneurs and private enterprises to start Sino-foreign joint ventures and Sino-foreign cooperative enterprises and join in reciprocal border trade and compensation trade where-in the foreign partner supplies materials for processing, supplies a sample to be copied in processing, or supplies parts for assembly. All approved foreign-invested enterprises enjoy State and regional preferential policies (for details, see following section on preferential policies for foreign investment).

To date, the government of the Tibet Autonomous Region has approved 115 foreign-invested enterprises, involving foreign investments totaling USS 160.65 million. Business people and partners to discussions and agreements came from the United States, Japan, Germany, Malaysia, Nepal, Macao, Hong Kong and elsewhere.