The 8th China Beijing International High-tech Expo is going to be held from May 23 to 27 in Beijing. The five-day event will showcase the latest sci-tech achievements to promote huge business opportunities brought about by cooperation through a series of activities, exhibitions, forums and seminars on special topics as well as sci-tech trade talks. Currently more than 40 delegations and 2,000 enterprises have registered to take part.

According to Zhou Maofei, vice secretary of the organizing committee and head of China Council for the Promotion of International Trade Beijing Sub-council, compared with previous Expos, this year’s will be more innovative.

In addition to the China Economy Summit, which has been held for two years, one of the biggest highlights will be the 1st China Recycling Economy Development Summit. A special exhibition area on the recycling economy and technologies for recycling energy will also be set up for the first time. The summit will conduct multi-level discussions on how to achieve sustainable economic development based on effective exploitation of energy and environmental protection.

The Academicians’ Forum on China’s Sustainable Development will also be established, inviting academicians from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and the Chinese Academy of Engineering to discussions on sustainable development and the national economy in next ten years.

A series of promotion meetings on overseas investment will also be held for the first time. Zhou said more and more domestic enterprises have an internationalizing strategy and are improving their competitiveness. Business officials from foreign embassies in China, visiting overseas delegations and domestic enterprises which have successful development experiences overseas will be invited to introduce the investment environment, market demands and preferential policies. Domestic enterprises that are capable of “going out” will have face-to-face communication with visiting delegations.

This year’s Expo will also gather eight world bourses together for the first time. Among them, New York Stock Exchange, NASDAQ and Singapore Exchange, South Korea KSE and London Stock Exchange will respectively hold special seminars, introducing domestic enterprises to overseas financing channels and overseas listing.

As the key content of this year’s Expo, the 2005 International Telecommunication Value-added Service Providers Promotion Meeting will be held. This is the first time for the Expo to give such a focus to telecom value-added services.

According to Zhou, China Telecom has shown great development potential in this area. In order to display new technologies and business opportunities involved, the promotion meeting aims to provide a platform for domestic and foreign service providers, and the operators of China Telecom. The meeting will include introduction to the latest application platform, business opportunities brought about by 3G and the most popular telecom value-added service both at home and abroad. It is reported that China’s major operators including China Unicom, China Railcom and China Netcom as well as SKT of South Korea have been confirmed to attend.

The Pioneering China - 2005 Chinese Pioneers Summit will also be held for the first time. It will invite China’s first batch of pioneering entrepreneurs who have achieved success to exchange views on how to realize sustainable growth with a backdrop of globalization.

Compared with previous Expos, this year’s will showcase more “made in China” hi-tech achievements. Zhongguancun Science Park, known as China's "Silicon Valley”, will specially display their independently developed innovative achievements.

It is reported that this year’s Expo has not only attracted the participation of China’s coastal cities, middle and western provinces and cities but also international attention. So far, 41 overseas delegations have registered to take part. Most of them are entrepreneur delegations from 20 countries lead by their own governments or business unions. Of them, it is the first time for delegations from Greece and some Islamic countries to join and search for business opportunities.

Zhou disclosed that Xinjiang, together with 53 of the country’s Development Zones, will jointly sign and set up the Middle Asia Trade Union during the period of the Expo. The Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region delegation will hold six cooperation and negotiation meetings as well as recruitment activities cooperating with research institutes and universities including the CAS and Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

South Korea will organize three separate trade missions comprising nearly 50 IT companies to take part in the Expo. The US, Austria, UK, Argentina and the province of Taiwan will organize 50-100 large enterprises in delegations.

Zhou believes with the participation of so many domestic and overseas enterprises, this year’s Expo will provide more cooperation opportunities for enterprises both at home and abroad.

(China.org.cn by Wang Qian, May 15, 2005)