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Banquet Hosted to Welcome ABAC Delegates
On the evening of October 19, a banquet was jointly hosted by the State Economic and Trade Commission (SETC) and Shanghai Municipal Government in Cypress Hotel Shanghai, to welcome the delegates of APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC).
More than 300 guests attended the welcome dinner, among them are ABAC delegates, diplomatic envoys to China and representatives from the local business community. The banquet was hosted by Mr. Zhang Zhigang, Vice Chairman of SETC. SETC Chairman Li Rongrong and Shanghai Mayor Xu Kuangdi delivered speeches respectively at this function. Mr. Qin Xiao, Chair of ABAC 2001 and Vice President of China International Trust and Investment Corp. (CITIC), presented an appreciation address on behalf of all ABAC members.
In the speech, SETC Chairman Li Rongrong spoke highly of the prominent role played by ABAC. Serving as the sole business advisory mechanism under the umbrella of APEC, ABAC has produced quite a number of valuable policy recommendations regarding the acceleration of trade and investment liberalization as well as economic and technical cooperation. Thus, ABAC has played a significant role to the sound development of APEC.
Mr. Li said that in today's ever-changing economic globalization, the process of trade and investment liberalization has dramatically advanced the development of international trade and investment. However, the overt-fast pace of trade and investment liberalization may affect the pace of some APEC Economies' industrial restructuring. Mr. Li highly commended ABAC's recommendation this year on market opening, capacity building and full participation. He hoped that all participants could join their hands and adopt convincing measures to facilitate the common prosperity and development of APEC Economies.
Finally, Mr. Li told the guests that in preparation for China's imminent WTO accession, the Chinese government was determined to rigorously abide by the WTO rules and continue to pursue the "reform and opening-up" policy in a more intensive manner, striving to bring about a unified, fair and just competition environment. To assure the transparency of the policies, Chinese government has been committed to publicize on designated official media all laws and regulations concerning foreign economic, trade and industrial policies. Any economy, any enterprise and any person can obtain from these media the latest developments of Chinese laws and regulations. When considered appropriate, SETC will offer the English version of some policies on other web-sites like the one run by APEC China Enterprises Assembly, so as to provide conveniences for APEC business people to conduct trade and investment in China.
In his address, Shanghai Mayor Xu Kuangdi extended his warm welcome to all the guests to the banquet on behalf of the Shanghai Municipal Government. Mayor Xu said that Shanghai was very honored and proud to host the 2001 APEC events and ABAC meeting. Till now, Shanghai has established close trade links with other APEC Economies from which approximately 70% of all foreign trade volume and contracted foreign capital flow. At the same time, nearly 40% of the overseas enterprises invested from Shanghai are taking foothold in different APEC Economies. By the end of this August, APEC Economies have invested in more than 20,000 projects in Shanghai with a total contracted foreign capital valued at US $34 billion, making up 70% of all foreign investment absorbed to Shanghai. Last year alone, Shanghai introduced more than 900 technological projects valued at US $7 billion, of which, 700 projects were from APEC Economies with a total value of US $6 billion. The economic relations between Shanghai and APEC Economies are expanding rapidly and their cooperation in the service sectors like banking, insurance and engineering contracting have been increasingly enhanced. By the end of last year, APEC Economies have set up 36 financial institutions and 6000 representative offices in Shanghai, doubled over 1995.
Mayor Xu believed that the holding of APEC meetings in his city has brought Shanghai unprecedented opportunities to further consolidate the economic cooperation ties between Shanghai and other APEC Economies. At the same time, the holding of APEC meetings will surely push ahead with the city's modernization drive and upgrade its management capability so as to elevate the overall competitiveness of the city.
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