Deputy Prime Minister Ho Duc Phoc attended the opening ceremony of the 21st China - ASEAN Expo (CAEXPO) and China - ASEAN Business and Investment Summit (CABIS) in Nanning city, the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (China), on September 24, according to a report from the Government News.

Speaking at the event, the Deputy Prime Minister put forward four priorities in the cooperation between the two sides.

Firstly, China and ASEAN should boost trade development in a balanced and sustainable manner through opening markets, facilitating trade and investment flows, and implementing free trade commitments such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the ASEAN–China Free Trade Area (ACFTA). Both sides need to complete the upgrade of the ACFTA to Version 3.0, and boost the application of digital technology and automation to customs clearance.

Secondly, both China and ASEAN should expand the connection of development strategies, expand regional economic corridors, and connect inter-regional transport routes. At present, Vietnam is building roads and railways linking with China, Laos, and Cambodia in a bid to strengthen transport connectivity in the region.

Thirdly, the two sides should spur high-quality investment, promote new growth drivers, expand investment and development cooperation to pioneering areas and new sectors of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, like the digital economy, green economy, clean energy, and develop high-quality human resources in support of these.

Finally, China and ASEAN step up people-to-people exchanges as well as cultural and tourism linkages, and create favorable conditions for young people and enterprises to understand one another. They should also work together to soon recover and develop tourism more strongly.

As an active and responsible member of ASEAN and a comprehensive strategic cooperative partner of China, Viet Nam has joined hands with other ASEAN countries to work closely with China and partners to promote new growth drivers and make practical contributions to the ASEAN - China comprehensive strategic partnership, Deputy PM Ho Duc Phoc said.

He described CAEXPO and CABIS as important symbols of the ASEAN - China cooperation.

Following the opening ceremony, the Deputy Prime Minister attended the launch of the Vietnamese pavilion and visited booths of Vietnamese firms at the expo.

Initiated by China at the 7th ASEAN-China Summit in October 2003, the CAEXPO has been annually held in Nanning city since 2004.

The CAEXPO has effectively promoted the trade in goods, investment cooperation, advanced technology transfer, trade in services, city-to-city exchanges, industrial connection and sub-regional cooperation of the two sides.