By He Yin, People’s Daily
The China International Import Expo (CIIE) is designed to trade goods and services, exchange culture and ideas, welcome visitors from across the globe, benefit the whole world and respond to the aspirations of people from various countries to live a better life, said Chinese President Xi Jinping when he hosted a banquet Monday evening in Shanghai to welcome distinguished guests from around the world, who are attending the second CIIE.
Xi’s remarks have provoked deep thinking about how the newborn CIIE has become an important international event that attracts wide participation of countries and enterprises from all over the world in a short time.
The second CIIE, which is slated to run from Nov. 5 to 10, catches the attention of people around the world as its inaugural version did last year. It is clearly becoming a phenomenal event in terms of both its scale and effect. The global public good introduced by China has been warmly welcomed by the world.
Countries around the world are enthusiastic about the second CIIE, which features a larger scale, higher quality and richer activities than the first one held last November. More enterprises from Europe, the U.S., landlocked African countries and South Pacific island countries have participated in this year’s expo.
With more products making their world debut or being showcased in China for the first time at the second CIIE, the event is expected to manifest growing “brand effect”.
Through the CIIE, the world increasingly realizes the huge potential of the Chinese market.
There wouldn’t be long-term development without participating the Chinese market, an exhibitor at the CIIE pointed out. To choose China is to open the door to future development.
With a population of nearly 1.4 billion and the world’s biggest middle-income group comprised of 400 million people as well as continuous consumption upgrading driven by the country’s efforts to boost high-quality economic development, China makes the CIIE naturally appealing.
What’s even better, China has taken measures to open its door wider to the world, continuously improve its business environment and strengthen the protection of intellectual property rights, which make the market all the more tempting.
It is a general consensus among various parties attending the CIIE that the event enables participants to seize the opportunities created by China’s development in the new era and achieve common prosperity and progress.
China provides a wide market for foreign enterprises to swim in the sea of opportunities, said Fabrice Megarbane, president and CEO of L’Oréal China. The expression has vividly described the relation between Chinese market and its participating enterprises.
The CIIE has further demonstrated the importance of openness and cooperation to the world. At the moment when protectionism is on the rise, international trade is facing slower growth and global foreign investment is troubled by sustained downward trend, it is a question facing all countries to choose between openness and isolation, and between cooperation and unilateralism.
While protectionism casts dark clouds over the world economy, China lights up a beacon by hosting the CIIE to promote free trade among different continents, according to Prensa Latina, the official state news agency of Cuba.
After the first CIIE, the sales of Egyptian oranges increased significantly in China.
Mamdouh Sallman, Egypt’s Minister Plenipotentiary of Commerce to China, said that as long as openness and cooperation become the general trend of the world, distance will no longer be too big an issue.
The CIIE makes people more determined and confident about openness and cooperation, which is one of the merits of the event.
The CIIE has enabled the world to better understand the significance of mutual benefits and win-win results. China builds a stage, and various countries across the globe perform a chorus together on it. That’s the best feature of the CIIE.
Products from around the globe can enter Chinese market, or even the world market though the platform, which is why more and more companies choose to launch their newest products and technologies at the CIIE.
Globalization requires more pragmatic communication, more open minds and wider win-win cooperation, said Lothar Herrmann, CEO of Siemens Greater China, stressing that the CIIE is exactly a good example for that matter.
The CIIE not only connects products and markets, but also ideas and beliefs. The world’s enthusiasm for the CIIE serves as a convincing evidence that the development concepts of openness, cooperation, mutual benefits and win-win results are widely supported by people all over the world.
