Production in China has included benefit from the opposite side of protectionism for some time now; when most countries abide by trade laws, those that don't gain increased exposure to international markets by virtue of offering cheaper goods via production-sans-design.

China itself may not, but the production groups within China have a pretty exhaustive recent history of largely ignoring IP regulations whenever profitable, and the market response has been widely happy-to-consume.

For a single example look at the history of composite bicycle manufacturing from the 60s onward, with specific detail on the emergence of China produced composite bicycles in the 90s -- it wouldn't have gotten off the ground at all without blatant IP theft spurring the first half.