BEIJING: China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi will attend the opening ceremony of the seventh China-South Asia Expo slated to be held in Kunming, Yunnan province, on Wednesday.
A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said on Tuesday that the expo titled “Solidarity and Coordination for Common Development”, will continue till 20 August.
The exhibitors from Pakistan as well as countries will display money clips, clothing, leather hats, etc. at the expo.
Over sixty countries and regions have signed up for the event, including all South Asian and Southeast Asian nations and RCEP member countries.
Nearly one thousand enterprises signed up to participate in the event, among which fifty are of the global five hundred companies.
Department of Commerce of Yunnan’s director Li Chenyang said that the expo has fifteen pavilions with an exhibition area of 150,000 square meters.
Vice Minister of the Ministry of Commerce Li Fei said that this year, China would focus on inviting more professional visitors according to the different requirements of exhibitors. China would also support exhibitors in matching target buyers effectively so that more expositions can be changed into commodities.
The Expo has been successfully held 6 times and has gradually developed into an increasingly influential platform integrating economic communication, commodity display, trade, investment cooperation and e-commerce.
First China-South Asia Expo
Li Fei said that in 2013, when the first expo was organized, the total trade volume between China and South Asian nations was less than one hundred billion dollars; the number increased to two hundred billion dollars in 2022, representing an average annual increase of 8.3%.
He added that China is also the largest trading partner of Bangladesh, Maldives, Pakistan, and other South Asian nations. Exports of aquatic products, nuts and tea from those nations to China keep increasing and gaining popularity among consumers in China.
Li also stressed the efforts that the Chinese government has made in synergizing the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) with the development of South Asian nations, particularly mentioning its iron brother, Pakistan.
He said that the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor had brought investment of 25.4 billion dollars to Pakistan, created 192,000 employment opportunities, generated 6,000 megawatts of electricity, built 510 kilometers of highways and developed 886 kilometers of the national core transmission grid.
