“China-EU Agricultural Trade Relations in a Global Context” China-EU Agricultural Economic Forum Held in Nanjing
On Oct. 13, “China-EU Agricultural Trade Relations in a Global Context” China-EU Agricultural Economic Forum, which was jointly hosted by Chinese Association of Agricultural Economics, European Association of Agricultural Economics and Nanjing Agricultural University, was held in Nanjing Agricultural University. Zhang Tianzuo, director of Industrial Policies & Regulations Department of Ministry of Agriculture, Zhou Guanghong, president of Nanjing Agricultural University, Alan Renwick, executive director of European Association of Agricultural Economics, Wang Dongyang, secretary-general of Chinese Association of Agricultural Economics and director of Institute of Agricultural Economics and Development, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and Zhu Jing, president at the School of Economics and Management at Nanjing Agricultural University, etc. attended and addressed the opening ceremony.
Director Zhang Tianzuo pointed out that China-EU agricultural cooperation was an important part of China-EU strategic partnership and the strengthening of China-EU agricultural cooperation was of significance; in recent years, relying on China-EU annual agricultural dialogue mechanism and centering on the director set by “Outline of Agricultural and Rural Development Cooperative Planning between China and Europe”, China and Europe made full use of their respective advantages, conducted effective cooperation in the fields of agricultural trade, agricultural sustainable development, geographical indication and agricultural scientific research and promoted the healthy development of China-EU agricultural cooperation. He introduced China was energetically promoting agricultural modernization, accelerating the transformation of agricultural production way, promoting agricultural structural reforms and cultivating the new kinetic energy of agricultural development from the following six aspects, including focusing on the construction of grain production capacity, adjusting and optimizing industrial and product structure, increasing the level of agricultural technology and equipment, building new-type agricultural operation system, reforming and perfecting the agricultural policies and making full use of “two types of resources and two markets”. Along with the sustainable progress and development of Chinese economy and society, China’s agriculture will more and more open to the outside world. He believed that in-depth discussion on China-EU agricultural trade and related issues in this meeting would surely produce fruitful results and played an active role in further promoting China-EU agricultural cooperation.
President Zhou Hongguang pointed out in the era of globalization, China-EU agricultural trade was win-win. China optimized the distribution of agricultural industry through China-EU agricultural trades and improved its agricultural development efficiency by using Europe’s advanced agricultural technologies and resources; China’s rapid economic development also provided a vast market for Europe’s agricultural products of high value-added. At the same time, as the England was independent of Europe and China’s economic development entered a new normal, China-EU agricultural trade also faced many uncertainties. Under this background, the holding of this meeting was very realistic. This meeting was the first meeting of this kind for European Association of Agricultural Economics jointly hosted in China. Taking this seminar as the key point, it hoped to build a broader platform, continuously deepen the exchange and cooperation in various aspects in the future development path and play an active role in the development of the related disciplines for Nanjing Agricultural University and Economics and Management in Agriculture and Forestry.
On behalf of European Association of Agricultural Economics, Alan Renwick thanks to Chinese Association of Agricultural Economics and Nanjing Agricultural University for the successful hosting of this international seminar. He introduced that European Association of Agricultural Economics attached importance to expand the relationship with Chinese Association of Agricultural Economics. This meeting, the 159th seminar of European Association of Agricultural Economics, was proposed to held in China by the former president, who hoped that the participating scholars actively participated in the discussion on China-EU agricultural trade in the global context and looked forward to the success and positive outcomes of the meeting.
On behalf of Chinese Association of Agricultural Economics, secretary general Wang Dongyang extended the congratulations on the holding of such academic annual meeting. He expressed that Chinese Association of Agricultural Economics and European Association of Agricultural Economics, Institute of Agricultural Economics and Development, CAAS and EU-related institutions had several collaborative researches. At the same time, he pointed out that the space for EU’s agricultural products entering Chinese market was accelerating the development, which brought great business opportunities for the green growth and sustainable development of EU agriculture. However, promoting the expansion of China-EU agricultural trades was only carried out smoothly with the principle of mutual benefit. For over 30 years, the progress of China’s market economy was speeded up year by year. Especially after joining the WTO, China has basically realized the full open to the agricultural markets in the foreign countries, including EU, and the market played a leading and decisive role in the Chinese economic system. By comparison, in mid-May, 2016, European Parliament passed a non-legislative resolution, which didn’t not only support to give China market-economy status, but also suggested using “non-standard” measures in the anti-dumping investigation in China; in addition, EU resorted to trade remedy measures and set discriminatory barrier for agricultural products imported from China, and had an impact on Chinese agricultural products through its own production and trade policy adjustment. Oppose trade protectionism, promote fair and open competition, consolidate the multilateral trading system and promote the mutual recognition and cooperation of agricultural standards and agro-product certificate would create a larger market and space for China and EU, especially for EU. EU’s agricultural direct subsidy policy concerned about environmental protection and sustainable development, which provided a reference for us to establish an agricultural subsidy system of green ecology-oriented. Through the exchange and suggestion of the experts in this seminar, it’s expected to promote the sustainable and healthy development of China-Europe agricultural trades.
In the following two days, the experts, scholars and representatives of teachers and students from the countries and regions, including Italy, New Zealand, Australia, America, Germany, Finland, Denmark, Ireland and other countries, nearly 30 colleges and universities at home and abroad, including EU, International Food Policy Research Institute (IRPRI),Lincoln University, University of California at Davis, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing University, Renmin University, Zhejiang Universtiy and China Agricultural University, and the research institutes would discuss the frontier issue and innovative ideas of China-EU agricultural trades in the global context in more than ten venues in the form of key-note speech and special session.