Danial Norjidi in Nanning, China

AS THE city of Nanning is all set to open the five-day 6th China-Asean Expo (CAEXPO) and the 6th China-Asean Business & Investment Summit (CABIS) beginning today, the China-Asean Free Trade Area (CAFTA), which will be signed next year, has become the centre of attraction.

The event organising committees held a news conference yesterday, which saw Mr Zhang Chaomei, Vice Director of the Trade Development Bureau of the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) of China, sharing information regarding the 6th CAEXPO and the 6th CABIS.

The conference was chaired by Mr Shen Ming, Director of the Press Centre of CAEXPO & CABIS Commanding Centre, Vice Director General of the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Guangxi Committee.
Other officials who also attended the conference were Mr Okti Z Maaruf, representative of the Asean Secretariat, and Mr Nong Rong, Vice Secretary General of the CAEXPO Secretariat.

Mr Zhang said, “With the joint efforts of all parties concerned, these two events act like a platform for the China-Asean friendly exchanges, business promotion and bilateral cooperation in various fields, which fuels the construction of the CAFTA.

“The CAEXPO not only focuses on the cooperation between China and Asean, but also opens to countries beyond this region, which have promoted the exchanges between China and the Asean region as a whole with other economies, enhanced the influences of China and Asean, and created a huge market and enormous business opportunities that cover 11 countries and beyond.”

Mr Zhang said the 6th CAEXPO and the 6th CABIS are held with the knowledge that CAFTA will be established next year.

A series of new measures have been adopted, including an extension of the fair period from four days to five, exhibition scale expansion, the introduction of the CAEXPO Financial Services Exhibition and the China-Asean Summit Forum on Financial Cooperation & Development, as well as the CAEXPO Agricultural Exhibition so as to help businesses to better share the CAFTA business opportunities and tide over the crises.

The media was also briefed on event preparations, from which four highlights can be summarised — “high-profile participants, active participation of enterprises, (and) a record number of booths for Asean”.

The high-profile participants attending the 6th CAEXPO and 6th CABIS include state leaders and ministerial officials of China and a few Asean countries, as well as the Secretary-General of Asean and a representative of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.

The 6th CAEXPO will have four exhibition pavilions, which are the Pavilion of Commodity Trade, Pavilion of Investment Cooperation, Pavilion of Advanced Technology and Pavilion of Cities of Charm.

Also notable are two new programmes, first of which is the CAEXPO Agricultural Exhibition, which has up to 600 booths, exhibiting agricultural materials, agro-based products, foodstuff, agricultural enterprises, and industrial parks and has attracted many leading enterprises and brand names.

The second new programme is the Financial Services Exhibition, which accommodates 125 booths, arousing keen interests of many leading banks, insurance companies and fmancial service institutions of China and other countries.

The expo will also have more market-driven and business-friendly programmes. Under this, over 80 programmes will be held during the 6th CAEXPO, including business networking programmes, seminars, exhibitors’ rostrum, sourcing conference, theme forums and more.

The third highlight is a variety of concurrent theme forums to promote bilateral cooperation, which sees the 6th CAEXPO spotlighting, as its theme of the year, the cooperation between Customs authorities and the business community. For this, the China-Asean Customs-Business Cooperation Forum will be held.

The 6th CABIS under the theme “China-Asean Free Trade Area & Asean Integration: Cooperation for Common Development” will see leaders of China and Asean countries delivering speeches.

The fourth highlight is “more considerate services to create a sound business environment”. The expo has set up more joint law enforcement teams and has adopted a variety of measures, which are “business-friendly” to ensure an environment which is sound for business.

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