Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin Photo: Chinese Foreign Ministry

China is committed to its fundamental national policy of opening to the outside world and pursues a mutually beneficial strategy of opening up, a spokesperson for China's Foreign Ministry on Tuesday, noting China's major trade fairs as examples of the country's high-level opening up. 

More foreign enterprises will be able to share opportunities through participating in such trade fairs as the China Import and Export Fair, also known as the Canton Fair, and the China International Import Expo (CIIE), Wang Wenbin, the Foreign Ministry's spokesperson, said at a regular press conference on Tuesday.

The 132nd Canton Fair concluded on Monday, while the 5th CIIE is scheduled to kick off in November.

"These two international exhibitions are vivid examples of China's efforts to promote high-level opening up and build an open world economy," said Wang. 

The Canton Fair, known as the epitome of China's opening to the outside world, has gone through 65 years, and the latest session had nearly 10,000 more exhibitors than the previous one, according to Wang.

Data on Tuesday showed that the overall number of participating enterprises in the 132nd Canton Fair, fully online, reached 35,000, increasing by 40 percent over the session held in April. 

Buyers of the Canton Fair come from a wider range, with 510,000 overseas purchasers from 229 countries and regions having registered, hitting a new high, official data showed. As of Monday, the fair's official website had been visited 38.56 million times.

Meanwhile, the 5th CIIE started trial operations for its online country exhibitions on Monday. The cumulative contract value of the first four CIIEs has surpassed $272.2 billion.

This photo taken on Oct. 24, 2022 shows a truck loaded with the first batch of exhibits arriving at the National Exhibition and Convention Center (Shanghai) in east China's Shanghai. The first batch of eight exhibits from seven exhibitors arrived at the National Exhibition and Convention Center (Shanghai), the main venue for the upcoming fifth China International Import Expo (CIIE), on Monday. (Xinhua/Fang Zhe)

Wang stated that for some time, however, economic globalization has faced headwinds and countercurrents, noting that some countries attempt to decouple with others, sever supply chains and build "a small yard with high fences."

"However, the more challenges we face, the more important it is for us to follow the logic of historical progress and ride the tide of development of our times, so as to achieve development of higher quality in a more open environment," said Wang, noting that China will never follow the old path of isolation and rigidity, and the world will never fall back into isolation and division.

"We will continue to create new opportunities for the world with our new development, and work to build an open world economy so as to deliver greater benefits to people of all countries," said Wang.

Global Times