China calls for expanding economic cooperation with ASEAN
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Xinhua, August 12, 2011
Chinese Minister of Commerce Chen Deming on Friday urged to further improve economic and trading cooperation between China and ASEAN.
At the 10th ASEAN Economic Ministers China's Ministry of Commerce Consultations, Chen and his ten counterparts from ASEAN countries reviewed and highly appreciated the fruits of cooperation in fields of economy and trade since the two sides established their dialogue relationship 20 years ago.
Chen said that the two sides in the past two decades, especially since the China-ASEAN free trade zone became operational on Jan. 1, 2010, had achieved remarkable success in terms of bilateral trade, investment and economic cooperation.
The trade value between the two sides has grown from eight billion U.S. dollars in 1991 to 292.8 billion dollars in 2010, up 37 times. In the first half of this year, the trade value between China and ASEAN reached 171.1 billion dollars, up 25 percent year on year.
By now, China has became the first largest trading partner and the second largest export market of ASEAN, while ASEAN has been the third largest trading partner of China.
In the investment area, the bilateral investment accumulated to 80 billion dollars from 20 years ago until this June. And the foreign direct investment of China to ASEAN accumulated to around 13 billion dollars, marking ASEAN as an important destination for Chinese enterprises while enacting their "going abroad" plan.
Chen added that the mutual-beneficial cooperation between ASEAN and China was also improved as China at present was supporting its cooperation with ASEAN in the field of infrastructure construction. In 2009, China announced to provide 15 billion dollars of credit for ASEAN and decided to establish a ten billion dollars China- ASEAN Investment Cooperation Fund, which were used by ASEAN in the construction of bridge, road, power plant and port.
The two sides also had pragmatic cooperation in fields of agriculture, finance, tourism, emergency disaster relief and human resources, and their cooperation under the framework of the Great Mekong Subregion and the East ASEAN Growth Area.
China and ASEAN should further improve their economic and trading cooperation, protect the stability and development of regional economy, so as to face the growing uncertainties and instabilities under the current shaking on International finance market.
The ministers also discussed the measures to further improve their cooperation. They said in a joint statement that the ministers welcome the completion of chapters on plant sanitary measures and technology trade barrier under the CAFTA framework, reached agreement on the dealing with general exceptional products, and decided to rename the China-ASEAN trade negotiating committee into China-ASEAN FTA joint committee.
According to the joint statement, the ministers expected the signing of an agreement on implementing the second batch of CAFTA service trade commitments on the China-ASEAN summit in Bali this November, welcomed China's proposal of establishing post-CAFTA era workshop this December in Guizhou, and expected the 8th China- ASEAN Expo in Nanning this October.
They also welcomed the report the feasibility study on the Pan- Beibu Gulf Cooperation, and would submitted the report to the summit this November for discussion.
