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| Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and heads of delegations attend the opening ceremony of the 20th CAEXPO and CABIS. (Photo: Duong Giang) |
Speaking at the opening ceremony, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh emphasized that CAEXPO and CABIS are important and prestigious events on economic, trade and investment cooperation between the ASEAN and China business community. After 20 editions, CAEXPO and CABIS have become symbols and leading flags of economic, trade and investment cooperation between China and ASEAN.
The past twenty years have witnessed remarkable progress in China-ASEAN relations, with bilateral trade rising from just 78.2 billion USD in 2003 to 975.6 billion USD in 2022, making China and ASEAN each other's largest trading partners and leading important investment partners.
In order to enhance economic, trade and investment cooperation between ASEAN and China as well as take full advantage of the CAEXPO and CABIS mechanisms to bring practical benefits to countries in the region, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh suggested:
Strongly promote balanced and sustainable development of bilateral trade, strive to make ASEAN China's first trade partner exceeding 1,000 billion USD; coordinate to build a chain from raw material areas to production centers and product consumption systems of each country; continue to open markets, fight protectionism, cooperate to improve the capacity to adapt to new standards, new tastes, and green products. Promote cooperation in science and technology, innovation.
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| Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh speaks at the opening ceremony of the 20th China-ASEAN Expo and China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit in Nanning City, Guangxi Province, China, on the morning of September 17. (Photo: Duong Giang) |
Promote strategic connectivity to develop both hard and soft infrastructure; promote high-quality, harmonious and mutually beneficial connectivity between the “Belt and Road” and ASEAN’s Viewpoint on Indo-Pacific Cooperation, as shared by leaders at the recent ASEAN-China Summit; strengthen connectivity in transport infrastructure, multimodal transport, especially railways and roads; spread and connect more widely to ASEAN countries as well as through China to bring ASEAN goods to Europe, Central Asia, etc.
Strengthen people-to-people exchanges and cooperation in culture, tourism, and aviation, striving to restore tourism cooperation to pre-Covid-19 levels. At the same time, promote cooperation in emerging areas, creating new growth drivers such as green economy, digital economy, circular economy, new materials, sharing economy, etc.
During this process, the ASEAN and Chinese business communities proactively learn, exploit, and help each other to make the most of opportunities from CAEXPO and CABIS, turning potential and cooperation opportunities into specific results and products.
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| Panorama of the opening ceremony of the 20th China-ASEAN Expo and China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit in Nanning City, Guangxi Province, China, on the morning of September 17. (Photo: Yang Jiang) |
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh affirmed that Vietnam is an active member contributing to the overall success of 20 CAEXPO and CABIS events. At this fair, Vietnam's trade pavilion is the largest after the host country China, with the participation of 120 enterprises, 200 booths, with diverse, high-quality products in fields where Vietnam has strengths and is highly complementary to the Chinese market.
Vietnam wishes to continue working with China and ASEAN countries to urgently complete negotiations to upgrade version 3.0 of the ASEAN-China Free Trade Agreement; upgrade road and railway infrastructure connectivity, and pilot the expansion of the smart border gate model to better meet the investment, business, trade, cultural and tourism needs of the business community and people of each country.
Speaking at the opening ceremony, Chinese Premier Li Qiang affirmed that China and ASEAN have become the most successful and vibrant model of cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region. Over the past 20 years, China-ASEAN trade has increased 16.8 times, the two sides have been each other's largest trading partners for three consecutive years, with cumulative two-way investment of more than 350 billion USD.
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| Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and delegates visited the exhibition areas of Vietnam, China and ASEAN countries. |
The two sides are constantly innovating new areas of cooperation and working closely on issues such as poverty reduction, climate change response, environment, and energy transition. China adheres to the neighborly diplomacy of “friendliness, sincerity, mutual benefit, and tolerance” in its cooperation with ASEAN countries and will continue to devote more efforts to this direction, firmly supporting ASEAN’s central role in regional cooperation.
To promote cooperation in the coming time, Chinese Premier Li Qiang suggested that China and ASEAN focus on: (i) enhancing close relations, maintaining regular dialogue and exchanges, enhancing common awareness, narrowing differences, expanding cultural, tourism, training and youth cooperation to consolidate the foundation of people-to-people friendship; making good use of cooperation mechanisms, creating a forum for sustainable cooperation and exchanges for businesses; (ii) further consolidating the foundation of sincerity and trust.
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| Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh visits the booth displaying high-tech products from China. |
China will persistently cooperate sincerely with ASEAN countries and is willing to implement cooperation agreements through practical actions; persistently open up and deepen opening up in terms of regulations, management, and standards, promote and protect fair competition, and create a safe and favorable investment and business environment; (iii) further enhance common interests, promote complementary economic advantages, cooperate in development based on the principle of mutual benefit, and further enhance the level of interest linkage.
China is willing to continue to expand the import of ASEAN countries' strong products, improve regional connectivity; expand cooperation in new areas such as green growth, digital economy, etc., build more stable and smooth regional industrial chains and supply chains; (iv) strengthen inclusive cooperation, persist in openness, tolerance, and solidarity. China is willing to promote strategic connectivity between the "Belt and Road" and the development strategies of countries, support countries in realizing their development goals, promote regional integration, and promote the improvement of the level of liberalization and facilitation of regional investment and trade.
During his attendance at CAEXPO and CABIS, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh inaugurated and visited the Vietnam and China Trade Pavilion.
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