Innovative Business Co-op committee discuss progress

Representatives from China and Finland have discussed here the work progress and fruitful cooperation of the China-Finland Committee for Innovative Business Cooperation in 2019, in a two-day meeting which closed on Friday.

More than 100 companies from both countries took part in the fourth meeting of the committee and related activities.

"The committee has been oriented to the needs of the enterprises, with the goal of promoting project implementation," said Zhao Changshan, Chinese chairman of the committee as well as chairman of Zhongguancun Development Group, in his speech at the meeting.

He noted that the number of Chinese member units has grown from 12 in the early days to 90.

Zhao gave various successful examples of the Sino--Finnish enterprise cooperation, such as the partnership struck up between Bank of China and Nokia Group.

Addressing the meeting, Risto Siilasmaa, Finnish chairman of the committee and chairman of Nokia Group, noted in his speech that the year of 2019 marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China and also the China-Finland Year of Winter Sports.

"Unprecedented number of high-level visits between Finland and China has laid a solid foundation for the economic, trade and investment cooperation between both countries," he said.

"Within the framework of the committee, companies from both countries have been active to contribute to the close relationship between Finland and China," Siilasmaa said, highlighting the cooperation agreements Finnish enterprises signed with Chinese partners on the second China International Import Expo.

Addressing the meeting, Zhai Qian, director of Department of European Affairs of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, pointed out that Sino-Finnish enterprises are increasingly cooperating not only in traditional industries of papermaking, machinery and communications, but also in new fields such as winter sports, new energy vehicles, infrastructure and art design.

"The two countries have highly complementary economic structures, and both support economic globalization and the multilateral trading system. The prospects for China-Finland economic and trade cooperation will be broader." Zhai said.

"Next year is the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Finland." Zhao said, "We will use this as an opportunity to consolidate and expand the cooperation between enterprises of the two countries, expand and implement professional working groups, and build a bridge for exchanges between scientific research institutions and talents."

Siilasmaa urged all to keep the strong momentum going in the following year, to expand win-win partnerships not only for the mega-sized companies, but also for small and medium-sized enterprises in both countries.