Business

China: Improving infrastructure for better connectivity with neighbors

In a recent conference in Beijing, President Xi Jinping vowed to enlarge China's shared interests with surrounding countries so as to enable China and its neighbors to seize more opportunities from each other's development and achieve common prosperity. China has proposed to set up a Silk Road Economic Belt through Central Asia, a Southern Silk Road linking China, Bangladesh, India and Myanmar, an infrastructure investment bank to finance construction projects in Asia, and to upgrade a free trade agreement with Southeast Asian countries.

China's new leadership has made a wise choice to boost trade with neighboring countries, said Guo Shengxiang, a renowned Australian economist. By 2020, bilateral trade between China and Russia is expected to reach US$ 200 billion, while China-ASEAN trade is aimed at US$ 1 trillion. As the US and European markets are shrinking in the wake of the devastating international financial crisis, China's economy has gradually embarked on a path of sustainable development driven more by domestic consumption than by investment and exports.

Chinese entrepreneurs are now investing hugely overseas, bringing vast cooperation opportunities to many developing economies, whose ongoing economic transition offers both sides large cooperation potential in trade, investment, infrastructure, finance and technology. The ancient Silk Road has now turned into a massive network of railways, highways, cables and pipelines carrying a tremendous flow of oil, cotton, rubber, and construction and communications equipment. A revival of the ancient network will bring vast profits to numerous businesses along the way, and promote the well-being of billions of people in the region.