Seventh CIIE to keep sharing China's development opportunities

The 7th China International Import Expo (CIIE) will be held in east China's Shanghai from Nov. 5 to 10. As a major platform for high-level opening up, the 7th CIIE continues to demonstrate China's continuous efforts to share its market opportunities with the world.

First held in 2018, the annual expo has fulfilled its platform function for international procurement, investment promotion, people-to-people exchanges and open cooperation, becoming a public good for the whole world.

Photo shows the Yangshan Special Comprehensive Bonded Area of the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone. (People's Daily Online/Ji Haixin)

According to Tang Wenhong, China's assistant minister of commerce, the total exhibition area of the 7th CIIE will exceed 420,000 square meters. It has attracted participants from 152 countries, regions, and international organizations in both Country Exhibition and Business Exhibition. As an important part of the CIIE, the Hongqiao International Economic Forum will include a main forum and 19 sub-forums.

The Business Exhibition will maintain its massive scale of over 360,000 square meters, attracting 3,496 exhibitors from 129 countries and regions. Both the numbers have surpassed those of the previous edition.

A record-breaking 297 Fortune Global 500 companies and industry leaders will be present, with 186 companies and organizations participating for seven consecutive years.

The 7th CIIE will continue to establish itself as a global platform for product debuts, cutting-edge technology launches, and innovative service introductions. It has attracted 39 government procurement delegations and 4 industry procurement delegations, totaling 780 trade sub-groups, achieving a new record.

The innovation incubation zone in the Business Exhibition has achieved improvements in both scale and quality this year. For the first time, it features four major tracks: digital economy, green and low-carbon technology, life sciences, and manufacturing technology, with both exhibition area and number of projects reaching historic highs.

The technology and equipment exhibition area will focus on three main themes: technology, industry, and environmental protection. The technology section will feature a dedicated area for new materials for the first time. The industrial chain in the integrated circuit industry section has been further improved and the artificial intelligence (AI) experience zone further upgraded.

This year's first "Jinbo" China-Europe freight train arrives at the Minhang Station in east China's Shanghai, October 20, 2024. The train from Germany is mainly loaded with cosmetics and mechanical equipment. (People's Daily Online/Shen Chunchen)

The industrial section is expected to highlight three exhibition areas: upstream industrial systems and basic equipment, midstream industrial control system automation and integration solutions, and downstream end-user applications.

The environmental protection section covers new energy, water treatment, and environmental technologies, and will be joined by four of the world's major water treatment companies.

The Country Exhibition continues to serve as an important platform for countries to showcase their images and trade and investment opportunities, featuring the participation of 77 countries and international organizations.

France, Malaysia, Nicaragua, Saudi Arabia, Tanzania, and Uzbekistan will be the guest countries of honor. The expo will provide free exhibition booths to companies from 37 least-developed countries, facilitating their participation in the Country and Business Exhibitions. It will also expand the African products zone. This demonstrates China's commitment to expanding unilateral opening up to the least-developed countries and making its development inclusive and universally beneficial.

The sub-forums of the Hongqiao International Economic Forum will address topics such as AI, new energy storage, new energy vehicles, and sustainable urban development, providing insights for emerging industries.

For the first time, it will host events themed around "sustainable development driven by new quality productive forces," to explore pathways for businesses to achieve green and sustainable development.

The CIIE, which aims to expand imports of high-quality products and services into the Chinese market, serves to showcase China's major opening-up measures. By constantly unleashing the dividends of openness, it strives to build a platform that allows the world to share China's new development opportunities.

A visitor experiences a robotic surgery microscope at the booth of German technology enterprise ZEISS at the Intelligent Industry and Information Technology exhibition area during the sixth China International Import Expo (CIIE), November 6, 2023. (People's Daily Online/Zhai Huiyong)

The previous six editions saw nearly 2,500 new products, technologies, and services make their debuts, with combined intended turnover reaching over $420 billion. The expo has facilitated precise matchmaking for more than 1,130 foreign enterprises and investment promotion agencies across different regions. Many exhibitors have gone on to open new stores, factories, and R&D centers in China.

Leveraging the vastly huge China market, the CIIE has enabled exhibits to become traded goods and exhibitors to spot more investment opportunities.

As China's frontier of opening up, Shanghai is seizing the opportunities presented by the CIIE to advance high-level international engagement. According to Hua Yuan, vice mayor of Shanghai, the city has undertaken a series of explorations and practices benchmarked against the highest international standards and best practices.

The China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone and its Lin-gang Special Area have shown remarkable progress. In the past five years since its establishment, the Lin-gang Special Area has seen the annual output value of industries above the designated size increase by 34.6 percent on average, and the actual use of foreign direct investment has reached an average annual growth rate of 45.3 percent. The special area has become a new engine for Shanghai's economic growth.

The city is also innovating new platforms for open cooperation. The pilot zone for Silk Road e-commerce cooperation, the first of its kind in China, has been set up in the city and made steady progress, achieving ten institutional innovations including "single declaration, bilateral customs clearance" and cross-border e-invoice interoperability.

Among the 104 key tasks outlined in Shanghai's overall plan for building the Hongqiao international opening-up hub, 100 have been implemented.