BEIJING – Premier Li Keqiang called for strengthening cooperation with Portuguese-speaking countries yesterday.
Li made the appeal via video link from Beijing during the opening ceremony of an extraordinary ministerial meeting of the Macau-based Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-speaking Countries (PSCs), also known as Forum Macau.
The meeting was held simultaneously, both online and offline, in Beijing and Macau. Apart from Li, the prime ministers and other senior officials from the forum’s PSCs also addressed the meeting by video link from four continents including Brazil’s Vice President Antônio Hamilton Martins Mourão and Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa.
Trade between China and the PSCs has exceeded US$100 billion for five consecutive years and reached US$200 billion last year, which fully demonstrated the resilience and potential of cooperation, Li noted.
Li pledged that China will make even more contributions to safeguarding world peace and promoting mutual development and prosperity of all countries together with the PSCs and the international community.
He put forward three suggestions: 1) maintaining peace and stability and promoting development and prosperity; 2) strengthening unity and cooperation, and defeating the COVID-19 pandemic as quickly as possible; adhering to open cooperation and promoting economic recovery while further opening up.
China is willing to increase cooperation with the PSCs in vaccines, medicines and health, Li said.
Calling for further enhancing trade and investment liberalisation and facilitation, Li said China is also willing to improve collaboration in advancing infrastructure connectivity, industrial capacity, energy conservation, and environmental protection with the PSCs.
Li underlined that the current international situation is turbulent and that the COVID-19 epidemic is still relapsing around the world. He also warned that uncertainties and destabilising factors in the world economy have risen significantly, while the safety and security of all countries are closely related.
The premier also said that China is willing to continue to play a constructive role with the international community, including the PSCs, in order to maintain peace and prosperity of all countries.
Li also highlighted the setting-up of the China-PSCs Epidemic Prevention Exchange Centre in Macau as one of the forum’s initiatives, in an effort to further improve the global health governance system. He also said that China is willing to continue to work with PSCs to promote trade and investment liberalisation, infrastructure connectivity and production capacity cooperation, and also to develop cooperation in green trade and energy conservation as well as environmental protection.
“Let’s work together to make the cake of cooperation bigger so that the fruits of development can benefit the people of all countries,” Li said.
The premier also reaffirmed Macau’s role as a “bridge” connecting China and PSCs, adding that the central government will further support Macau to consolidate its function as a service platform for business cooperation between China and PSCs, so as to better leverage its uniqueness.
Ho pledges more efforts to improve China-PSCs platform
Meanwhile, Chief Executive said in his speech at the China-Portuguese-speaking Countries Commercial and Trade Service Platform Complex in Nam Van yesterday afternoon that Macau will make even greater efforts to further improve its role as a platform linking China and PSCs.
Ho said that Macau will speed up integrating itself into the nation’s development pattern of dual circulation of domestic and international markets, further serve as a bridge for two-way exchanges and cooperation between the Chinese mainland and the PSCs, and help build a community with a shared future for mankind.
During the process, Macau will fully tap its own advantages, work actively with the forum, and help achieve fruitful results in the exchanges and cooperation between China and PSCs, Ho said, adding that the setting-up of the Guangdong-Macau In-depth Cooperation Zone in Hengqin will help enrich Macau’s role of a platform linking China and PSCs.
Themed “Cooperating to Fight Against the [COVID-19] Pandemic, Collaborating for Common Development”, the meeting aimed to help enhance cooperation between China and PSCs in the field of health care, and jointly promote post-COVID-19 economic recovery, Ho added.
Founded in Macau in 2003, the forum yesterday welcomed Equatorial Guinea as its 10th member country. The African country’s membership was formalised in the meeting’s joint declaration. Aside from China and Equatorial Guinea, the forum includes Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Portugal, Guinea-Bissau, East Timor, Cape Verde, and São Tomé and Príncipe.
The meeting also included a plaque-unveiling ceremony for the new China-Portuguese-speaking Countries Exchange Centre for Epidemic Prevention at the complex.
Ho and Fu Ziying, director of the Central People’s Government Liaison Office in the Macau Special Administrative Region (MSAR), unveiled the plaque.
Forum Macau Secretary-General Jia Xianzheng admitted in an interview with public broadcaster TDM last week that the forum has still to reach its full potential. However, he stressed that trade between China and Portuguese-speaking countries has grown 17 times since the forum was established 19 years ago.
The forum is overseen by the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) in Beijing.
Premier Li Keqiang addresses yesterday’s extraordinary meeting of the Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-speaking Countries at the China-Portuguese-speaking Countries Commercial and Trade Service Platform Complex in Nam Van. Photo: Maria Cheang Ut Meng
Chief Executive Ho Iat Seng (right) and Central People’s Government Liaison Office Director Fu Ziying yesterday unveil the plaque of the new China-Portuguese-speaking Countries Exchange Centre for Epidemic Prevention at the China-Portuguese-speaking Countries Commercial and Trade Service Platform Complex in Nam Van. Photo: Maria Cheang Ut Meng
