Foreign and Chinese visitors at the China-CEEC Trade and Investment Expo in Ningbo, Zhejiang province, in June. Provided to China Daily

The China-CEEC Trade and Investment Expo in Ningbo, Zhejiang province, is a platform for China and Central and Eastern European countries to strengthen trading and mutual understanding.

The event, first held in Ningbo from June 8 through 12, attracted thousands of government officials and representatives of business enterprises from China and 16 CEE countries.

The event was held under the Belgrade Guidelines for Cooperation between China and the CEE countries, signed by Premier Li Keqiang and CEE leaders in Belgrade, Serbia, in December 2014.

The five-day event strengthened Sino-CEEC cooperation in economic and trading, culture, forum and exhibition sectors.

A total of 18 events, including the China-CEEC Investment and Corporation Seminar and China-CEEC Two-way Investment Cooperation Industrial Park Promotion achieved results in business, education, culture promotion and tourism, a Ningbo official said.

Promoting business ties

CEE countries introduced 132 investment projects that covered sectors including agriculture, construction, power supply and transportation at the seminar.

More than 200 domestic companies including China Power Investment Corp, China Spacesat Co and Beijing Urban Construction Group and more than 70 companies from CEE countries participated in the seminar, at which four investment agreements were signed.

"We have long planned to invest in Poland but did not find a good starting point, so the China-CEEC expo is an ideal platform for us," said a company representative from Harbin, Heilongjiang province.

The Harbin company plans to import red wine from Poland after a discussion with Andrzej Juchniewicz, director of the Polish Information and Foreign Investment Agency.

"We participated in the expo because there are many private businesses in Zhejiang and they are eager to invest outbound," Juchniewicz said. "We also expect to find more Chinese investors through this platform."

Park cooperation

The expo is an ideal platform to promote industrial parks in China and CEE countries. Representatives of 12 industrial parks from China and CEE countries attended the promotional meeting.

"The Euro-Chinese Economic Development Zone is the largest and the most successful industrial park in 16 CEE countries," said Zhang Changqing, a shareholder in the ECEDZ. "We welcome Chinese companies to invest in the ECEDZ."

Deals were signed between the Ningbo Economic and Technical Development Zone and the Poland Bydgoszcz Industrial and Technological Park as well as between the Cixi Economic Development Zone and ECEDZ.

The China-CEE (Ningbo) Trading and Logistic Park and China-CEE (Ningbo) Industrial Park were launched on June 10 to enhance trade ties between China and CEE countries.

"The event marks Ningbo playing a more significant role in promoting trading ties between China and CEE countries," said Miro Sarovic, deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers and Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Relations of Bosnia and Herzegovina. "Ningbo will be an important city in future cooperation."

Distribution channel

More than 200 companies from CEE countries demonstrated more than 3,000 of their products that are available in Ningbo at the expo. More than 1,200 Chinese professional buyers attended the expo and signed more than 110 agreements with partners from CEE countries.

Many exhibitors from CEE countries said they would attend the 2016 expo because they found it to be a professional, effective and international exhibition platform.

"Hungary has abundant agriculture resources and has close trading ties with Zhejiang," said Laszlo Szabo, deputy minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Hungary. "We will continue to open up to eastern regions.

"We launched direct flights between Beijing and Budapest a month ago," he said in June. "We hope we will have direct flights between Zhejiang and Budapest soon."

Online Silk Road

The event organizers also arranged a matchmaking event between CEE companies and Zhejiang's cross-border online traders. The event attracted 60 cross-border online platform operators from Zhejiang and more than 50 CEE companies. Eight agreements were signed during the event and many more companies reached preliminary agreements.

The organizers arranged a service station to provide consulting services covering logistics, warehousing and cross-border insurance.

Permanent exhibitions

The Ningbo government plans to invest 4 billion yuan ($626.98 million) to build a China-CEEC Products Trading Pavilion. The pavilion will be the permanent location for the China-CEEC Products Trading Fair, which will operate throughout the year.

In addition, the China-CEEC guesthouse project, with investment of 1.25 billion yuan, was launched in June, along with the China-CEEC Products Trading Pavilion Project.

Local authorities said the China-CEEC Products Trading Fair and two pavilions will be platforms for CEE countries. A part of the China-CEEC Products Trading Pavilion is in operation and houses 36 companies that provide more than 3,000 products from CEE countries.

Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia have also confirmed their participation.

Operators of the Czech pavilion plan to conduct cross-border online trading and establish a crystal products distribution center in Ningbo.

"There will be more exhibitors from Bulgaria to promote their products in Ningbo next year, which is an important city on the Belt and Road," said Lyuben Petrov, deputy minister of the economy in Bulgaria.

zhuanti@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 11/23/2015 page10)