The Japanese leaders' visits to the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo remain the biggest obstacle to the development of China-Japan relations, Chinese Commercial Minister Bo Xilai said.

In an interview with Japanese media including NHK and Nippon Keizai Shimbun during his recent visit to Japan, Bo said the obstacle should be removed as soon as possible.

After the obstacle is eliminated, China and Japan should draw up a future plan and comprehensively strengthen their cooperation in trade and economy, he said.

The two countries have a wide space of cooperation in the fields of energy-saving, environmental protection, cooperation among medium- and small-sized enterprises, the development of the mid and west part of China and the implementation of plans to reinvigorate China's Northeast region, said the Chinese minister.

He said Japanese companies had outstanding advantages in energy-saving and environmental protection, and China's development requests assistance in those fields. With Japanese technology and experience coupled with China's vast market, the two countries can cooperate well in the two fields, Bo said.

China and Japan are close neighbors and both peoples have achieved much, as Japan is now the second largest economy in the world with a GDP of more than 4 trillion U.S. dollars and China has continued its fast development for the last 27 years, Bo said.

If the two great peoples could cooperate better, their economic development would surely achieve synergies, he said.

In order to promote trade and economic relations between China and Japan, both sides should take steps to create a favorable political environment for bilateral trade and better conditions for the steady increase of investment. Improved relations would also bring about new cooperation in the energy-saving and environmental protection field, he said.

When China and Japan established their relations in 1972, their bilateral trade was only 1.1 billion U.S. dollars, but last year the figure had climbed to 184.4 billion dollars, he said.

The statistics showed that the two economies are complementary to each other and their development is mutually beneficial. If the Chinese and Japanese peoples can cooperate better, they can enjoy mutual development, he added.