President Wu Hailong of China Public Diplomacy Association Attended 2019 Xi’an Silk Road Business Summit
2019-12-10 13:12:00

2019 Xi’an Silk Road Business Summit was held in Xi’an on December 7. The People’s Government of Shaanxi Province, Xi’an Municipal People’s Government and Silk Road Chamber of International Commerce(SRCIC) co-hosted the summit,which was guided by All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, Chinese Association for International Understanding, and China Public Diplomacy Association(CPDA). Vice Chairman of the 12th CPPCC, Chairman of Silk-road Planning Research Center Chen Yuan, former Vice Prime Minister of Bulgaria Alexander Tomov, President of CPDA Wu Hailong, and senior officials of Shaanxi Province attended and addressed the summit. Chairman of SRCIC Lu Jianzhong presided over the opening ceremony. More than 400 guests from Russia, Italy, Bulgaria and other 73 countries and regions attended the summit, who are former senior officials, diplomatic envoys in China, chairmen of chambers of commerce and business representatives.

Chairman Chen Yuan said that the business circle and non-governmental organizations played a role in this summit in promoting smooth construction of the Belt and Road Initiative to be open, inclusive, balanced, and win-win.

Former Vice Prime Minister of Bulgaria Alexander Tomov delivered a speech on behalf of foreign guests, saying that new initiatives were adopted and projects were developed in this summit, contributing lots of new ideas to the construction of the Belt and Road Initiative, which were quite significant.

President Wu Hailong said that the world is undergoing changes unseen in a century. In this changing situation, we face unprecedented challenges and new opportunities. Currently, unilateralism and protectionism are rampant; the international trade takes a battering; the industrial chain is hit; the global economic growth is weak; the business circle is bearing the brunt and suffering. Under this grim situation, shrinking and complaining would be of no avail. Only struggling and fighting can help the business circle survive from the impasse. The Belt and Road Initiative is an opportunity and effective solution for getting out of the dilemma. Leaders of the business circle have an important mission and play a decisive role in the construction of the “Belt and Road” Initiative and a community with a shared future for mankind. We should jointly draw the blueprint of the “Belt and Road”, and be steadfast in the construction of the “Belt and Road” Initiative with more enthusiasm, more strength, higher level, and better quality. We should diversify methods of cooperation and implement the sharing mechanism so as to make the “Belt and Road” Initiative to be the “driving force” of the world economy, the “well-being” which benefits the people of the countries along the routes, and “nemesis” of unilateralism and protectionism.

Silk Road Business Summit has been held successfully for 4 times since 2016, which has been a major people-to-people diplomacy event under the framework of the “Belt and Road” Initiative. More than 10 chambers of commerce and industry like Nigerian Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture joined in SRCIC, which has 218 organization members from 82 countries and nearly tens of millions of enterprise members. 62 cities from 22 countries joined in the Silk Road Urban Alliance established by SRCIC. This summit, consisting of 14 theme activities including 4 parallel forums, signing and awarding ceremony, and Sino-Foreign Enterprises Cooperation Fair, covers topics such as integrated development of culture, commerce and tourism, financial innovation, economic and trade cooperation, people-to-people and cultural exchange, and the construction of Free Trade Area, etc.