China, CELAC seek connectivity on Belt and Road at ministers' meeting
A worker packs nectarines in a factory of Agricola Garces in Mostazal, Chile on Jan. 19, 2018. Chilean cherries have been viewed by Chinese customers as a "trademark" from the Latin American country. Now, the Chilean fruit suppliers are working to entice Chinese customers with new flavors. "Chinese consumers are always looking for new things," says Cristian Tagle, marketing manager of Chile's largest Cherry exporter Agricola Garces. The exporter is now trying to open up the Asian giant's market by introducing more products, from grapes to blueberries, avocados and nectarines. (Xinhua/Xu Rui)
The second ministerial meeting of the China-CELAC (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States) Forum opened here Monday is an opportunity for the two sides to find common ground for their future development and seek connectivity on the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative.
In recent years, especially since the first ministerial meeting of the forum in Beijing in 2015, the two sides have sought to build more solid ties through expanding trade and investments in such areas as infrastructure, energy and agriculture.
"NATURAL EXTENSION" OF B&R
In his congratulatory message to the second ministerial meeting of the forum, Chinese President Xi Jinping called on Latin American countries to actively participate in the Belt and Road Initiative and forge a trans-Pacific path of cooperation that links China and Latin America more closely.
"The congratulatory letter from President Xi Jinping is a letter that we have expected for a long time. The promotion of the Belt and Road Initiative led Latin America into a new era," said Enrique Posada, director of the Confucius Institute and coordinator of the Asia-Pacific Observatory both based in Colombia's Jorge Tadeo University.
Proposed by China in 2013, the Belt and Road Initiative refers to the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road, aimed at building a trade and infrastructure network connecting Asia with Europe, Africa and beyond.
"It is a very visionary development plan, which could be combined with our Latin American and Caribbean countries' own national development programs and goals. We are willing to participate," said Kamina Johnson-Smith, Jamaica's minister of foreign affairs and foreign trade.
Dennis Moses, Trinidad and Tobago's Foreign and the Caribbean Community Affairs Minister, believes that the initiative has aroused strong passions for participation among Latin American and Caribbean countries.
"The Belt and Road Initiative is a significant creation and has become a new opportunity of China-Latin America cooperation," Moses said.
Though geographically far apart, China's efforts in localizing the Belt and Road Initiative in Latin America and the Caribbean have been widely recognized among experts.
Latin America is a "natural extension" of the Belt and Road, said Patricio Giusto, chief executive officer of Diagnostico Politico, a local think tank in Argentina. "The cooperation framework would fuel more trade and investment between China and Latin America."
In the distant past, the people of China and Latin America overcame great difficulty in crossing vast seas and jointly created the maritime Silk Road spanning the Pacific, said Xi.
"For those Latin America countries who have not entered into cooperation with China, it is no doubt a great opportunity," Posada said, referring to Xi's message as a "chance to accept the invitation from China in recent years."
"The ties between China and Latin America would be enriched with their destinies tightly bound," Giusto noted.
Alicia Barcena, who has watched China's evolving relationship with the region from a front-row seat as executive secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, said in terms of public policy, China and CELAC members can work together to meet their separate targets.
"China is not only going to build a land-ocean integrated connectivity, but also to enhance aviation and digital connectivity," she said.
INVITATION FROM CHINA
China is willing to work with Latin America and Caribbean States (LAC) to build trans-oceanic and maritime inter-connectivity in the construction of the Belt and Road, Foreign Minister Wang Yi said when addressing the opening ceremony of the second ministerial meeting of the forum.
Wang said that China will actively participate in the construction of transport systems, infrastructure, and energy facilities in the LAC.
China is willing to sign cooperation deals within the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative with more countries in the region and to promote the launch of more projects to yield fruitful results of cooperation between the two sides, Wang added.
The foreign minister pointed out that China and the LAC share a solid foundation for building the Belt and Road together, with China-LAC relations developing rapidly, China-LAC cooperation upgrading constantly as well as the increasing deepening of integration of interests between the two sides.
China has signed bilateral free trade agreements with Chile, Peru and Costa Rica and has signed production capacity cooperation deals with multiple regional countries, said Wang.
China and the LAC have also enhanced financial cooperation in various forms, said Wang, noting that arrangement has been made for over 17 billion U.S. dollars as part of a 35-billion-dollar worth of financing package.
A special fund of 30 billion dollars for production capacity cooperation has also been launched, he added.
Wang said China will facilitate trade and investment with regional countries and will do its best to cultivate the China-LAC market of mutual benefit and openness for 2 billion people, he said.
Wang also called on China and the LAC to build independent and advanced industries, accelerate production capacity cooperation and jointly establish the three major channels of logistics, electric power generation and information.
In this regard, the private sectors, societies and the governments of the two sides should make joint efforts, enhance financing channels of funds, loans and insurance, and support the LAC in building independent and diversified industrial systems, said Wang.
China is willing to align its scientific and technological innovative action plan with the LAC and is willing to support medium-sized and small countries of the LAC in building capacities of combating climate change, said the foreign minister.
The two sides can enhance cooperation in emerging areas of aerospace, renewable energy, artificial intelligence, big data, the Internet and biomedicine, he added.
While noting that China and the LAC are developing countries and emerging economies, Wang said China is also willing to strengthen communication in governance and expand exchanges among political parties, local governments, media outlets, think tanks, cultures and youths.
With construction of the Belt and Road as an opportunity, China is willing to work with the LAC to build trans-oceanic inter-connectivity between China and the LAC, to promote optimization and upgrading of China-LAC cooperation, to innovate development, and to develop a new situation of cooperation in broader areas, with a better structure, with more energic driving forces and with a higher quality, Wang said.
OUTCOMES OF MEETING
The ministerial meeting approved three key documents -- the Santiago Declaration, a joint action plan, and a special declaration on the Belt and Road Initiative, Chilean Foreign Minister Heraldo Munoz said.
While the Santiago Declaration contains the main consensus reached at the meeting, the joint action plan for cooperation from 2019-2021 defines areas of common interest such as renewable energy, science and technology, infrastructure, and the environment.
"(The) special declaration on the Belt and Road Initiative ... has been unanimously welcomed by Latin American and Caribbean countries," Munoz said.
"We hope that the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road does not remain in Europe but reaches Latin America and the Caribbean," Munoz added.
The outcomes of the meeting are expected to enhance bilateral trade, currently worth over 200 billion U.S. dollars annually.
Alicia Barcena, who has watched China's evolving relationship with the region from a front-row seat as executive secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, said in terms of public policy, China and CELAC members can work together to meet their separate targets.
"China has a commitment to reduce poverty by 2020 and we in Latin America want to achieve it by 2030. China has already made enormous efforts ... That is a very important demonstration, that there are those seeking the welfare of the people and showing it can be achieved," she said.
She added that in order to reduce poverty, CELAC must invest annually at least 6.7 percent of GDP on infrastructure, which could be achieved with China's support.
"This meeting wants to play a role in this common destiny of a more peaceful, more sustainable world, which is part of the (UN) 2030 Agenda (for Sustainable Development). I believe that China can be a factor, a very important trigger for the world to achieve shared prosperity," Barcena said.
Kamina Johnson Smith, foreign minister of Jamaica, picked up on the theme of shared prosperity, using the example of the achievements China and Jamaica have seen in their joint relationship, from sports to infrastructure.
"Jamaica has been enjoying, over the last two or three years, one of its most diverse periods of cooperation with China. This has been enjoyed at the level of people-to-people exchanges, scholarships and training. Jamaica even has coaches from China in synchronized swimming, badminton and other sports," she said.
Johnson Smith highlighted a highway from Jamaica's south to north coast, built and funded by a Chinese company, as well as mining projects, such as bauxite extraction and aluminum refining.
Completed in March 2016, the four-lane 67.2-km expressway linking Jamaican capital Kingston in the south with the tourist city of Ocho Rios in the north, cost 721 million U.S. dollars. It was financed, constructed and is being operated by China Communications Construction Company.
"We are an excellent example of this type of partnership. As we have also heard from Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, there is interest in improving sea transport. Our work on our ports and logistics hub as well as the special economic zones being created close to our ports will be able to host neo-Panamax-size vessels, which will facilitate trade with China," she said.
Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza thanked Chinese President Xi Jinping for his efforts to nurture closer ties between China and CELAC.
"He saw in Latin America a partner, he saw brothers, and he treated CELAC like a valid exchange partner, as the organization that is the joining of...all the interaction mechanisms (in the region)," he said.
"President Xi Jinping saw this with great clarity. When the first China-CELAC Forum happened (in Beijing in 2015), he personally came to inaugurate it, to meet the foreign ministers and representatives of international delegations," Arreaza added.
"And later when the Belt and Road Forum (for International Cooperation) took place in 2017, President Xi invited presidents from Latin America and the Caribbean to be present ... I think China will ... always interact respectfully with Latin America, seeking the development and happiness of its people," he said.
(Source: Xinhua)
