EU and China Sign Nine Cooperation Agreements Go back »
2009-02-05 | All chapters
EC and China Sign Nine Cooperation Agreements and Foster Dialogue on Global Solutions to Economic and Financial Crisis and Climate Change
Chinese Prime Minister WEN Jiabao visited the European Commission on 30th January upon invitation of the President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso. The Prime Minister was accompanied by Mr YANG Jiechi, Foreign Affairs Minister, Mr ZHANG Ping, Chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, Mr CHEN Deming, Minister of Commerce, and Mr XIE Fuzhan, Director of the Research Office of the State Council. The Chinese delegation met with President Barroso and Commissioners Ferrero-Waldner, Dimas, Almunia, Potočnik and Ashton. They discussed overall EU-China relations, the international financial crisis and climate change. Nine agreements were signed on this occasion to strengthen EU-China cooperation in several fields (see annex). President Barroso underlined the importance that the Commission, as well as the European Union, attach to strengthening our already broad ties with China and invite China to engage with the EU in addressing two of the global challenges of 2009: overcoming the economic and financial crisis and reaching a comprehensive agreement on climate change in Copenhagen. Premier Wen and President Barroso agreed that the XI EU-China Summit should be convened as soon as possible under Czech Presidency of the EU. This was confirmed later by Czech Prime Minister Topolanek at the official lunch. This would open the way to another Summit to be held in China still in 2009.
President Barroso and Premier Wen confirmed the mutual interest on pursuing the High Level Dialogue on economy and trade, and agreed on a second round to take place in April. Both parties expressed commitments to keep open markets, in the context of the current financial and economic crisis. In this sense, consultations on the continuation of the Doha round, as well as the Macroeconomic Dialogue should also be developed.
President Barroso said: “This visit was a good opportunity to reinforce EU-China relations and gave an impulse to our bilateral cooperation as well as our activities in facing the current global challenges like the international economic and financial crisis. The year of the Ox, which represents hard-work and patience, started this week and is a very appropriate opportunity to make progress in our ongoing bilateral negotiations on a Partnership and Cooperation Agreement, to strengthen our dialogue on political and human rights issues, as a way of improving mutual understanding, and to achieve further successes in our bilateral cooperation”.
Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy, Benita Ferrrero-Waldner, added: “Following last year's visit of the Commission to Beijing today's meeting provided an excellent and timely opportunity to discuss not only bilateral cooperation but wider foreign policy issues of mutual interest and ways how the EU and China can work together in bringing more security to crisis regions. Our bilateral relationship is characterised by deep and growing cooperation in a broad range of areas. This can be seen in the host of agreements that we signed in the margins of today's meeting.”
Commissioner for Trade, Catherine Ashton, said: "Getting our relationship right requires a lot of hard work, but the rewards more than justify the effort. EU-China trade must continue to be a motor for the world economy in these difficult times. Our leadership is needed especially to complete the Doha Round. We should step up our cooperation to find new opportunities for trade and investment, for instance in green technologies. I am looking forward to exploring this at the next meeting of the EU-China High Level Economic and Trade Dialogue Mechanism."
This visit by Prime Minister Wen was the return trip to the visit that President Barroso made to Beijing on 24-25th April 2008, accompanied by Commissioners Ferrero-Waldner, Dimas, Kovács, Kuneva, Mandelson, Michel, Piebalgs, Potočnik and Špidla.
The visit has been instrumental in giving a high-level impulse to bilateral cooperation within the EU-China strategic partnership which the Commission intends to continue to develop and enhance based on mutual interest.
The visit has also taken place a couple of months after the first G20 meeting dedicated to the financial crisis (Washington, 15 November 2008) and two months before its next meeting on 2nd April, in London. It was therefore a very timely opportunity to make a mid-time review of the impact of the financial crisis both in China and in the EU and to discuss how China and the EU might work together more efficiently to prevent it from deepening further and easing its consequences on our respective economies and peoples.
After the main meeting, there was an official lunch, to which five more Members of the College participated (Commissioners Kovács, Špidla, Kuneva, Orban and Vassiliou), as well as the Czech Prime Minister and President in office of the European Council, Mr. Topolanek. Focus of the discussion was on fighting climate change, as 2009 will be a key year in the negotiations to reach a comprehensive post-2012 agreement at the U.N. Conference in Copenhagen in December. The European Union and China are two key players in this process, and as such, need to show leadership to ensure that we will succeed in reaching this objective.
During this lunch, Prime Minister Wen, President Barroso and Czech Prime Minister Topolanek agreed that the XI EU-China Summit should be convened as soon as possible under Czech Presidency of the EU.
List of Agreements signed:
This programme will provide opportunities for hundreds of Chinese and European students and academics to pursue their studies in Europe and China, respectively.
This programme is funded with €26 M for 5 more years, (i.e. from academic year 2009-2010 onwards) EU-China Policy Dialogues Support Facility (PDSF+)
The purpose of this project is to provide additional funds (€1.8M, up to a total of €7.8M) to continue facilitating and supporting the implementation of the different Policy Dialogues between the EU and China Civil Aviation Cooperation Programme
This project will provide institutional capacity building to relevant Chinese governmental and industrial entities to accommodate the rapid growth of China's civil aviation sector and it envisages the transfer of knowledge and best practices from the EU. China-Europe Public Administration Project II (CEPA II)
This project aims to help improve the performance of the Chinese administration and public service and establishing dialogue platforms between European and Chinese public administrations. Europe-China Clean Energy Centre (EC2):
The initiative was agreed at the 2007 Summit. This project will create a permanent Centre in Beijing to promote the use of cleaner energy technologies and to support energy conservation and efficiency, thus assisting China in its transition to a low-carbon economy. Bilateral Coordination Mechanism on Forest Law Enforcement and Governance (FLEG)
The overall objective is to contribute to the reduction of illegal logging and associated trade globally, in order to promote sustainable development. Memorandum of Understanding on Occupational Health and Safety
This MoU provides a framework for policy discussion, mutual learning and exchanges of experiences and good practices in the occupational health and safety field, including the safety of workers in coal mines. Action Plan on Customs Cooperation between the European Community and China with regard to enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)
This Action Plan is intended to strengthen the application of customs controls to combat counterfeiting and piracy in the trade between the EU and China and to provide a basis for further actions to combat counterfeiting and piracy EC-China Agreement on Drugs Precursors
The objective of this bilateral agreement is to strengthen administrative co-operation with Chinese authorities to monitor trade and prevent the diversion and trafficking of drug precursors in international trade