Q: Do you think the growth of China’s foreign trade will continue to decline this year and can foreign trade grow by 10 percent this year as said by Premier Wen in the government work report? Will China’s trade surplus continue to decline this year?

A: Although the growth of our foreign trade has been declining ever since last August, the combined growth rate of foreign trade for this January and February is still projected to be around 7 percent. It’s possible that we see greater growth of foreign trade in the second half of this year. Despite the ongoing debt crisis in Europe and the rising production cost in China, the foreign trade growth target is still attainable though requires a lot of efforts.

We plan to take more measures to encourage the import of advanced technologies, key equipment, important raw materials and some consumer goods popular with Chinese people.

Q：Please introduce how the damage and post-war reconstruction of Chinese enterprises in Libya is going and what measures will the Ministry of Commerce take to guarantee the normal operation of Chinese enterprise there? Beside, how's the impact of other Arabian countries' unrest in relation to trade between China and Arabian countries?

The Chinese government including the Ministry of Commerce makes great efforts to protect overseas Chinese people's security.

After the sudden rebellion in Syria, the Chinese Foreign Ministry evacuated 35,800 Chinese people from Syria.

About Chinese projects in Libya, we only left a few people there and many projects are entrusted to local natives to take care of.

China has no investment in Libya. Reports saying China has tens of billions of dollars of investments in Libya are untrue. We just have projects in Libya, most of which have been finished or are near finishing.

These projects have been subject to attacks and great damages in the war. We are negotiating with the Libyan government about compensation. We are evaluating the security conditions in Libya and when conditions are good, we will resume construction of those projects.

From Libya's case we learn the importance of stability for a country. We are raising the risk awareness and warn Chinese engineer teams in Arab. Most engineers of the projects there have returned to China. We have left about 100 people there. If conditions are good, we'll resume reconstruction of the projects.

Q: I am with the Bloomberg News Agency. The WTO is going to hold a seminar on the relationship between exchange rate and trade. My question is, what’s China’s take in this aspect? I heard that the US and Brazil are criticizing China’s exchange rate.

Also China’s export to Europe is declining. What’s your expectation on the trend?

A: Yes, the WTO will hold an academic seminar referring to exchange rate and trade at the end of this month, and China will send its delegation to the meeting. But as it is an academic discussion, I don’t think it’s authorized to push for the appreciation of the RMB exchange rate.

I don’t think what you’re saying about Brazil’s criticizing China’s exchange rate is accurate. I remember that the president of Brazil said in March that developed countries shouldn’t shift their exchange rate problems to developing and undeveloped countries.

Talking about China’s export to Europe, last year, China saw a slight drop in exports to Europe, at 2% to 3%. I think it’s mainly due to the ongoing European economic crisis. The door of China’s trade to Europe is always open. China believes that Europe can walk away from the trouble, but it takes time. China and Europe are close trade partners and China’s investment in Europe is on a rise. Last year, China’s exports to Europe was $350 billion. China and Europe are in the same boat, and we would like to extend help to them.