BEIJING, Oct. 9 -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang's trip to Germany, the second time since he took office last year, will see the two countries navigate their partnership to a more innovative path.

Economic and trade cooperation between the two partners has expanded rapidly in recent years. Germany is now China's biggest European partner in trade, investment and technological cooperation, while China is Germany's largest trading partner in Asia. Bilateral trade exceeded 160 billion U.S. dollars last year.

The huge potential in economic cooperation is unlocked by frequent exchanges of high-level visits between Beijing and Berlin, which have deepened political mutual trust and injected sustained strong momentum into their partnership.

Germany will be the first country that Li has visited twice as Chinese premier. The trip comes after a state visit in March by Chinese President Xi Jinping and a tour of German Chancellor Angela Merkel to China four months later.

It is rare in the history of China-Germany relations to see such a high frequency of top-level visits in one year, which demonstrates the close interaction between the two countries' leaderships and the height of bilateral ties.

Both Beijing and Berlin place high hopes on their inter-governmental consultation mechanism, which covers dozens of dialogue and communication channels and represents the highest level of its kind between China and the West.

During his visit, Li and Merkel will co-chair the third round of China-Germany inter-governmental consultations under the theme of innovative partnership.

The meeting, to be attended by over 20 ministerial officials from both countries, is expected to map out a comprehensive, systematic and long-term action plan for the two globally hefty economic powerhouses to further advance their cooperation on the wheels of innovation.

Around two dozen inter-governmental agreements and big commercial contracts will be inked in such fields as informatization, energy, science, education, agriculture, health, aviation and environmental protection.

Beijing and Berlin's cooperation in innovation, especially in industrial informatization, finance and aviation and space technology, will complement each other's advantages to achieve mutual benefit and win-win results, and give new impetus to bilateral ties.

The Chinese premier will meet German President Joachim Gauck and address the seventh China-Germany economic and technological cooperation forum during his stay in Berlin.

While in Hamburg, he will attend the sixth meeting of the biennial Hamburg Summit and deliver a keynote speech to expound China's view on the China-Europe relationship and its development direction.

It is plain that Li's trip will further improve the quality of China-Germany cooperation, uplift their relations to a higher level and inject new impetus into the sound development of China-Europe ties.