Guangxi seeks cooperation with Japanese firms in Guangzhou on ASEAN market

Aerial photo taken on July 14, 2021 shows the view of Nanning City, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. (Xinhua/Lu Boan)

South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region held a conference on Tuesday with Japanese enterprises based in Guangzhou of Guangdong Province to seek economic and trade cooperation on ASEAN market, reported Chinanews.com.cn.

Japan is one of the main and traditional foreign trade markets for Guangxi. Since the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) came into force at the beginning of 2022, Guangxi has been making consistant efforts to help foreign companies to make good use of the RCEP rules, which will also benefit Japanese industries with strong competitiveness to explore third-party markets including ASEAN, said Wei Ran, Chairman of China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) Guangxi Committee.

As a connecting node region between Southeast Asia and South China, where a large number of Japanese enterprises have settled in, Guangxi attracts much attention in Japan, said Kamei Keiji, Consul General of Japan in Guangzhou, who attended the meeting via video links. 

There is huge room for cooperation between Guangxi and Japanese enterprises in agriculture and forestry, automobile, non-ferrous metals and other industries, Kamei Keiji added.

Guangxi is speeding up the construction of the New International Land-Sea Passages connecting China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries, which aims to be a mode of transportation with the shortest time and the best price.

Nippon Express (China) Co., LTD., a subsidiary of Japan's largest integrated logistics company Nippon Express, has set up an office in Nanning, the capital of Guangxi, to carry out logistics business from Southeast Asia to China.

Representatives from well-known Japanese enterprises in Guangzhou including Mitsubishi Corporation (MC) and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (China) also attended the conference online.