BEIJING: China will continue to promote the greater opening up of market opportunities and implement policies in order to remove all restrictions on foreign investment in the country’s manufacturing sector, Chinese Premier Li Qiang said during his keynote speech at the opening ceremony of the 6th China International Import Expo (CIIE) and the Hongqiao International Economic Forum.
Addressing the event in Shanghai on Sunday, Li Qiang said China, with a population of over 1.4 billion people and a middle-income group of more than 400 million people, presents huge potential in terms of market demand, and the country has always desired to share its market opportunities.
Li said that China would actively expand imports, promote coordinated development of trade in services and goods, support innovation in foreign trade formats and models, implement negative lists for cross-border service trade, and boost digital trade.
He added that China’s imports of goods and services are likely to reach $17 trillion in cumulative terms in the next five years.
Beijing will soon release an overall plan to promote top-standard institutional opening up in the Shanghai free trade zone and set up a pilot zone for Silk Road e-commerce cooperation in the city.
China Sincerely Hopes to Work with Other Countries
He told the gathering that China sincerely hopes to work with other nations in the world, to meet each other halfway, and achieve shared success on an open stage.
This year’s CIIE Country Exhibition features 72 countries and international organizations, while the Business Exhibition is likely to attract over 3,400 enterprises from 128 countries and regions.
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Covering 367,000 square meters, the exhibition features a record-high 289 of the world’s top five hundred enterprises and industry giants.
The business exhibition area and number of projects in the Innovation Incubation Area have doubled in contrast to the previous expo.
Notably, there are sixty-four Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) partner nations participating in the Country Exhibition, with over 1,500 related companies participating in the Business Exhibition. The exhibition area is also approximately 30% bigger compared with the previous expo.
