'Huge potential' seen in trade with US

China and the United States have tremendous potential to grow bilateral trade and investment and promote globalization, analysts said on Wednesday when the US President Donald Trump began his state visit in Beijing.

Chinese and US companies signed deals worth more than $250 billion during Trump's visit. Deals include purchases of Boeing aircraft, Ford automobiles, US soybeans and the joint development of liquefied natural gas in Alaska.

Rebecca Nadin, head of risk and resilience at the London-based think tank Overseas Development Institute, said Trump's visit to China is "definitely a step in the right direction toward building better understanding between the two countries".

Nadin said the way the visit follows so closely after China's 19th CPC National Congress demonstrates that the White House recognizes it must engage with China to resolve a range of issues from trade disputes to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's nuclear issue.

During the Congress in Beijing last month, President Xi Jinping set out China's short-and long-term development direction, with modernization targets for the country.

Nadin said China was committed to a multilateral approach to resolving many of the world's emerging challenges. China's commitment to global issues including climate change and combating international terrorism would benefit from cooperation from the US.

Ben Robinson, a senior economist at the London-based think tank Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum, said he expects China and the US to collaborate more on promoting free trade, with an emphasis on intellectual property protection and openness to trade.

Encouraging step

Alan Barrell, a professor and entrepreneur in residence at the University of Cambridge, said the two leaders' growing understanding is an encouraging step for the world's biggest two economies to realize the immense complementarities in their economies, and send a positive signal to their mutual trade partners.

"As China's economy experiences a structural shift and moves up the value chain, it will have many opportunities to collaborate with the US especially in high technology, advanced engineering, data science and artificial intelligence areas," Barrell said.

"In addition, friendly trade relations between the US and China will be encouraging for their mutual trade partners, in Asia, Europe and other places. In particular, international multinationals with operations in both the US and China would find it much easier to streamline their supply chain if these two countries reduce trade barriers, and international stock market would experience more confidence also," Barrell said.

Diffusing tension on the Korean Peninsula is another topic on the agenda of the US-China discussions.

Christopher Bovis, a professor of international business law, said the two countries have great ability to collaborate through the United Nations and through diplomatic channels, to ensure peace and security.

cecily.liu@mail.chinadailyuk.com

(China Daily 11/10/2017 page11)