APEC Senior Officials to Open Informal TalksSenior Officials from 21 member economies opened their informal talks on 15 October 2001 in Shanghai to finalize plans for a two-day annual Ministerial meeting opening on 17 October 2001. The Meeting was chaired by H.E. Mr. Wang Guangya, APEC SOM Chair and Vice Foreign Minister of China.In his opening remarks, Mr. Wang Guangya pointed out that, guided by the theme ???Meeting New Challenges in the New Century: Achieving Common Prosperity through Participation and Cooperation, most of the work under the agenda of APEC 2001 have been completed during the past ten months. As the Ministerial Meeting and APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting are coming up, the task for the informal SOM is to wrap up the whole package of the deliverables and report to the Ministers and Leaders. He further called for member economies to work together, act ambitiously as well as practically, to turn a new leaf in the history of APEC. Issues ranging from trade and investment liberalization and facilitation, economic and technical cooperation, as well as new economy and APEC outreach strategy will be discussed. Senior Officials are expected to submit to the Ministerial Meeting a series of major outcomes including the result of Osaka Action Agenda review, Individual Action Plans of member economies, follow-up on Beijing Initiative of human capacity building, Ecotech Action Plans, e-APEC Strategy and APEC Communications and Outreach Strategy. APEC Senior Officials held other three meetings this year in Beijing, Shenzhen and Dalian in February, June and August respectively. |
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