On the morning of November 7, Premier Li Keqiang and Russian Prime Minister Medvedev co-chaired the 23rd regular meeting between the Chinese and Russian Prime Ministers in Beijing. The two prime ministers witnessed the signing of a series of pragmatic cooperation documents and achieved fruitful results. Recently, official from the Department of Eurasian Affairs interpreted the major economic and trade results of this meeting:
During the 23rd regular meeting between the Chinese and Russian Prime Ministers, China and Russia reached important consensuses on economic and trade cooperation, which injects new impetus into the development of bilateral economic and trade cooperation and points out the direction for the development of bilateral economic and trade relations in the next stage. Specifically, the Prime Minister’s meeting has achieved four economic and trade achievements:
First, in terms of trade, MOFCOM and Russian Ministry of Economic Development signed the Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation in the Service Trade, and agreed to establish a service trade cooperation working group to strengthen information exchange and platform construction for the cooperation in key areas such as tourism, culture, transportation, education, exhibition and outsourcing, which has created favorable conditions for the development of service trade between the two countries. The two sides also agreed to promote the sound and stable development of the cross-border e-commerce. The customs departments of the two countries signed a memorandum of cooperation on e-commerce customs clearance, which will further enhance the level of trade facilitation between the two countries. In addition, the two sides agreed to continue to strengthen cooperation in the multilateral areas, safeguard the multilateral trading system with the WTO as the core, and jointly oppose unilateralism and protectionism.
Since the beginning of this year, Sino-Russian bilateral trade has grown rapidly. According to the latest statistics of China, the trade volume between China and Russia in January-October reached US$87.25 billion, with an increase of 28.2% year on year. The growth rate ranked first among China’s main trading partners, and the trade scale has exceeded the level of last year (US$84.07 billion). The record high of US$100 billion in the whole year is a foregone conclusion.
Second, in terms of strategic large projects, in the field of satellite navigation, the two sides signed an intergovernmental agreement on cooperation in satellite navigation systems, marking a new phase of cooperation between BeiDou Navigation Satellite System and Global Navigation Satellite System, which will provide legal and organizational guarantee for extensive cooperation between the two countries in the field of satellite navigation. In the aerospace field, the two sides signed a cooperation agreement on space debris monitoring and data application, which laid the foundation for the two sides to start cooperation in the field of space debris. In the nuclear field, the two companies signed the business contract for the No.7 and No.8 units of the Tianwan Nuclear Power Plant and the Demonstration Fast Reactor Project. This is a further implementation of the contract signed by the two parties in the nuclear field in June this year, marking the official entry of the cooperation project into the implementation phase.
Third, in terms of agricultural cooperation, the two sides signed the Agricultural Development Plan for Northeast China and the Russian Far East and Baikal Region, which clarified the key areas for agricultural cooperation and related policies and mechanisms in the above-mentioned regions, and will promote agricultural cooperation between the two countries to a new level. They signed the inspection and quarantine protocol for the two-way trade of frozen poultry and dairy products, which will create positive conditions for the expansion of agricultural trade between the two countries. In addition, the two sides also reached an important consensus on strengthening comprehensive cooperation in the agricultural sector, and agreed to carry out industrial chain cooperation in production, processing, warehousing and logistics in various fields of agriculture, animal husbandry and fishery to comprehensively improve the quality and level of agricultural cooperation.
Fourth, in terms of local cooperation, the two sides approved the Plan on China-Russia Cooperation and Development in the Russian Far East (2018-2024) signed by MOFCOM and Russian Deputy Minister of the Development of the Russian Far East. This is a programmatic document for the cooperation in the Russian Far East between the two countries. In addition, the two sides agreed to hold the 6th China-Russia Expo in Harbin on June 15-19, 2019. At that time, a number of business activities will be held around key areas such as economy, trade, investment and local cooperation in order to build a platform for the exchanges and cooperation both between regions and between enterprises.
Besides, both sides also reached consensuses on the cooperation in fields such as scientific and technological innovation, finance, industry and transportation.
Overall, this meeting has yielded fruitful results and laid a solid foundation for the economic and trade cooperation between the two countries to take a new step in the new era. Next, MOFCOM and the relevant departments will strengthen coordination with Russia, in order to further play the role of inter-governmental cooperation and consultation mechanism, fully implement the important economic and trade consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, and comprehensively improve the quality and level of Sino-Russian economic cooperation.
