| Chinese Business Delegation Set off for Europe on July 4th |
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| 2009-07-10 13:26 |
| From:Mofcom Article type:Original |
The Chinese Trade and Investment Business Delegation headed by Chinese Deputy Minister Gao Hucheng set off for Europe on July 4th. It is the fourth time for China to send business delegation to Europe for trade and investment promotion, and also a positive follow-up to Hu Jintao’s visit to Italy and Portugal and Premier Wen Jiabao’s “Confidence Tour” at the beginning of this year. Those government organizations that in the delegation are Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Ministry of Railways and Ministry of Environmental Protection, and industrial associations are China Foreign Trade Center, China chambers of commerce for import and export of machinery and electronic products, foodstuffs, native produce & animal by-products, textiles, metals minerals & chemicals, and light industrial products and arts-crafts, and service trade associations. In the delegation are also 300 entrepreneurs. The delegation includes powerful large enterprises and many SMEs with capability of overseas investment and international operation that are strongly interested in exploring overseas market and would like to cooperate with their European counterparts in such fields as investment, trade and technology.
During the visit, the Chinese business delegation will hold bilateral trade and economic cooperation forum & entrepreneur activities in Italy, Sweden, Finland and Portugal. The activities will build a platform for Chinese and overseas enterprises to share information and strengthen cooperation. They will sign a series of contracts and LOI on two-way investment, technological cooperation, introduction of advanced equipment, trade in goods and service, memorandums among commerce associations, local government agencies and trade shows, and governmental agreements for promoting two-way investment, energy conservation and environmental protection, high technology and SMEs’ cooperation. In addition to strengthening the current China-EU trade and economic cooperation, it will help explore new cooperation fields and further promote the development of China-EU trade, deepen the two-way investment and economic and technological cooperation.
China and the EU is important trade-economic partner to each other. The EU is China’s largest trade partner, the largest source of technology introduction and the fourth largest source of the actual investment, while China is EU’s second largest trade partner. During January to May, 2009, the volume of Sino-EU trade reached $129.26 billion, a share of 16.9% of China’s total trade, higher than the 16.6% in year 2008. In addressing the financial crisis, China as always advocates opening-up strategy based on mutual benefit, maintains fair market environment, actively strengthens the trade and economic cooperation with all countries and regions including the EU, and demonstrates the clear-cut standpoint in opposing the trade protectionism. The Chinese business delegation’s visit to Europe would be conducive to the further development of Sino-EU trade and economic cooperation and Sino-EU comprehensive strategic partnership. |
