The European Chamber 2024 Roundtable Meeting with Tianjin Municipal People's Government

2024-04-18 | Tianjin

On 18th April, 2024, European Chamber Tianjin Chapter had a roundtable meeting with Tianjin Municipal People's Government. Tianjin Vice Mayor Li Wenhai, European Chamber President Jens Eskelund, along with Vice President Carlo D'Andrea and Tianjin Chapter Chair Christoph Schrempp attended the meeting.

During the meeting, President Jens Eskelund expressed gratitude to the Tianjin Municipal Government for the meeting opportunity, introduced the European Chamber's mission and highlighted the findings of the Chamber Business Confidence Survey 2023. Tianjin Chapter Chair Christoph Schrempp introduced the Tianjin Position Paper 2022/2023, praised the success of the local green electricity market. Averes Bernd, Tianjin Chapter local board, the General Manager Commercial of Volkswagen Automatic Transmission (Tianjin) Co., Ltd shared their successful story of accessing to 100% green electricity in 2023.

Tianjin Vice Mayor Li Wenhai stressed the GDP of Tianjin in Q1 of 2024 was increased by 5.3%. Li highlighted plenty of plans made by the Tianjin Government for further improving the local business environment, which include 1)over 5.5 billion kilowatt-hours green electricity is to be supplied in Tianjin market to meet the local demand expected; 2)2024 Tianjin Business Environment Enhancement Program is to be carried out in 2024; 3)financial support for production equipment upgrades has offered to all foreign and domestic manufacturers.

The discussions between the European Chamber and Tianjin local government covered a number of issues, including deepening industry-university cooperation and the need to improve the system of flexible working hours—which enables businesses to set employees’ working hours based on current business needs—particularly in manufacturing. The Chamber delegation also stressed the importance of government support for small and medium-sized enterprises.