Africa-Press – Cape verde. More than 600 businesspeople will participate in a business meeting in China and Portuguese-speaking countries, which returns on April 23, after a four-year hiatus due to the pandemic, it was announced today.
The prediction was made by Ji Xianzheng, secretary-general of the Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-speaking Countries, better known as the Macau Forum.
“The Portuguese-speaking countries will certainly also form delegations from business promotion institutions,” the Chinese leader told journalists.
Macau’s Governing Action Lines for 2024, released in November, had already mentioned the return of the Meeting of Businessmen from China and Portuguese-Speaking Countries.
The initiative will take place on the third and final day of the sixth ministerial conference of Forum Macau, which includes the signing of the organization’s action plan until 2027, a document that was discussed today by the institution’s Permanent Secretariat.
After the meeting, Ji Xianzheng said that the plan will cover new areas of cooperation, including the digital economy, e-commerce, sustainable development and climate change.
The holding of the sixth ministerial conference, between April 21st and 23rd, was announced on Monday, but the secretary-general assured that preparations “did not start yesterday, they started several months ago”.
Ji admitted that the Macau Forum is still “contacting with the capitals of Portuguese-speaking countries to collect information on the formation of delegations”, but demonstrated confidence in the presence of ministers at the conference.
Five ministerial conferences were held in the territory in 2003, 2006, 2010, 2013 and 2016, during which Action Plans for Economic and Trade Cooperation were approved.
Initially scheduled for 2019, the sixth ministerial conference was postponed to June 2020, due to the elections for the Macau Legislative Assembly, but with the covid-19 pandemic it ended up not taking place.
China established the Macau Special Administrative Region (SAR) as a platform for strengthening economic and commercial cooperation with Portuguese-speaking countries in 2003 and, in that same year, created the Macau Forum.
The Permanent Secretariat of the Forum includes three deputy secretaries-general: East Timorese Danilo Afonso Henriques (appointed by Portuguese-speaking countries), Xie Ying (appointed by China) and Casimiro de Jesus Pinto (appointed by Macau).
The Permanent Secretariat also includes nine delegates from Portuguese-speaking countries: Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Mozambique, Portugal, São Tomé and Príncipe and Timor-Leste.
Exports of goods from Portuguese-speaking countries to China reached 147.5 billion dollars (136.1 billion euros) last year, the highest value since Forum Macau began presenting this type of data officials, in 2013.
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