Liao Min, deputy director of the office of the Central Commission for Financial and Economic Affairs, said that since the US agreed to reduce parts of tariffs imposed on Chinese products, China would consider not introducing tariffs on US products scheduled for Sunday.

Wang said the nations have had in-depth discussions about intellectual property protections, including protecting intellectual property in the pharmaceutical industry, and about cracking down on counterfeiting on e-commerce platforms.

“These measures are in line with our reforms to strengthen [intellectual property] protection, and this will also help China promote its economic development,” Wang said.

Ning Jizhe, vice-chairman of National Development and Reform Commission, did not specify the value of US agricultural products China would purchase, saying that the text of the agreement was still being examined and that concrete details would be released later.

He also said China would expand imports in energy and services from the US.

Vice-minister of agriculture Han Jun said China would buy more US pork and poultry, which are urgently needed to stabilise China's domestic needs.

“The implementation of the deal will expand agricultural cooperation between China and the US,” he said.

China's purchase of US agricultural products recorded a year-on-year drop of 32.7 per cent in 2018. China imported US$10.4 billion agricultural products from the US from January to October, dropping by 30.8 per cent from the same period last year because of the tariffs.

Vice-foreign minister Zheng Zeguang said on Friday that China was committed to working with the US and avoiding confrontation, but also that it would not give in on sovereignty and security concerns.

“China will continue to make its position clear regarding incorrect rhetoric from the US,” Zheng said, though he did not provide details of such rhetoric.

Beijing had earlier vowed to retaliate after the US passed two pieces of legislation that would allow sanctions of Chinese officials seen as undermining human rights in Xinjiang and Hong Kong.

“When China and the US cooperate, there will be benefits. But conflicts will lead to harmful results,” Zheng said. “We hope the US and China can be accommodative to each other … and expand cooperation in various fields.”

A new 15 per cent tariff on around US$160 billion of Chinese goods that was scheduled to come into effect on Sunday was cancelled. The duties had targeted Chinese goods that had previously avoided them, including many popular consumer products such as smartphones and gaming consoles.

A 15 per cent levy on about US$120 billion of Chinese imports will be cut to 7.5 per cent, while an existing 25 per cent tariff will remain on about US$250 worth of goods from the country, according to USTR.

The tariffs that remain will be used as leverage “for future negotiations” on the next stage of the deal, Trump said in a White House briefing shortly after the accord was announced. “Because China would like to see the tariffs off, and we’re OK with that, but they’ll be used as a negotiating table for the phase two deal,” he said.

The first phase also includes commitments from China to reform its intellectual property protection regime, further opening its services sector, and will take steps to mitigate charges of currency manipulation and tackle forced technology transfer from foreign companies.

To put the agricultural purchase commitment in context, China imported US$137 billion in agricultural goods in 2018, but it has never bought more than US$25.9 billion from the US, which it did in 2012. That figure shrank to US$9.2 billion last year, as tariffs weighed heavily on the bilateral farm trade.

It is understood that the size and nature of the agricultural purchases had been a major sticking point in the negotiations, with China keen to purchase according to its domestic demand. This was complicated by an African swine fever outbreak that has threatened to wipe out half of the country’s pig population, therefore reducing demand for soybeans that are used mainly in pig feed.

“This agreement creates greater certainty for American businesses, after months of uncertainty, as they plan for the year ahead,” said Myron Brilliant, executive vice-president of the US Chamber of Commerce.

“When fully implemented in both letter and spirit, China’s commitments have the potential to create a better environment for US businesses exporting to and investing in China, and begin the process of rebalancing the US-China economic relationship.”

Asian markets responded in kind. On Friday, the Shanghai Composite Index recorded its best daily performance since August 19, while the Hang Seng Index – Hong Kong’s stock exchange – posted its best intraday gain since October 11, in response to media reports that a deal was close.

US markets closed virtually unchanged on Friday after seeing sharp increases the previous day, when news of an impending deal was reported.

Analysts, meanwhile, were not getting carried away by the deal’s potential impact on either economy.

“The reported agreement is noteworthy both for its modesty and for how long it took to achieve,” said Stephen Olson, a former US trade negotiator, now a senior fellow at the Hong Kong-based Hinrich Foundation.

“These represent some of the lowest-hanging fruits in the negotiation, and some of which would have been discussed earlier in the year,” said Tai Hui, chief Asia market strategist at JP Morgan Asset Management. “The future stages of negotiation is going to be much more challenging when it starts to involve China’s industrial policy and technological development.”

John Gong, a professor of economics at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing, said that a deal would “relieve pressure on China's economic slowdown”.

Analysis of a phase one deal, conducted before all the details had been confirmed, suggested that it could lift US economic growth in 2020 by 0.1 per cent, as well as lowering inflation.

“The positive impact on China’s economy is likely to be a little more than the US, but the largest positive impacts will be on the smaller and more open Asian economies of South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore,” Nomura analysts wrote.

Additional reporting by Robert Delaney in Washington