Remarkable achievements have been made over the past 18 years since the SCO was established.

First, trade has expanded rapidly. In 2018, total trade between China and other SCO members reached 255 billion dollars, up by 17.2% year-on-year and seven percentage points higher than the overall growth rate of China’s foreign trade.

Second, investment and financing has produced fruitful results. By the end of April 2019, Chinese total investment in other SCO members exceeded 87 billion dollars. Many major projects in energy, minerals and industrial manufacturing sectors are proceeding smoothly. The total contract value of Chinese projects in SCO members amounted to 237.8 billion dollars. A host of road, transmission lines and oil and gas pipeline projects have boosted regional development.

Third, connectivity has improved markedly. The Agreement on International Road Transportation Facilitation has taken effect. The China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan highway has opened to traffic. The Central Asia-China gas pipeline and the China-Kazakhstan and China-Russia oil pipelines have been put in operation. The China-Europe block train has been up and running regularly and efficiently. Within the SCO block a compound infrastructure network of highways, railways and oil and gas pipelines has started to take shape, paving the way for closer trade and economic cooperation among SCO members.
We have made the following efforts since last year’s Qingdao Summit.

First, we encourage SCO member states to participate in the China International Import Expo. Their active participation in at the first CIIE has yielded many fruits. As many as 388 companies from SCO member states took part in the business exhibition with an area of 12,800 square meters and a total transactional value of 1.35 billion dollars. We’ve heard that businesses from SCO members are equally enthusiastic about the second CIIE this year.

Second, we support the building of a demonstration zone in Qingdao for subnational trade and economic cooperation between China and SCO members. MOFCOM, together with relevant departments and Shangdong provincial government, formulated a master plan for the construction of the demonstration zone. We also support hosting the SCO investment and trade expo in Qingdao, help the demonstration zone attract more investment from the SCO members and import more quality products from these countries.

Third, we make solid efforts to implement the Joint Statement of the Heads of Member States of the SCO on Promoting Trade Facilitation. China is working together with relevant member states on signing an SCO trade facilitation agreement to explore regional trade institutional arrangement and safeguard free trade and multilateral trading system with real actions. Thank you.