Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyễn Hồng Diên and Secretary of the Party Committee of China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Liu Ning in Hà Nội on Friday. — Photo from the Ministry of Industry and Trade

HÀ NỘI — Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyễn Hồng Diên on Friday held talks with Secretary of the Party Committee of China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, and co-chaired a conference on Việt Nam - China (Guangxi) trade and economic cooperation in the new era.

At the talks, Diên highly valued Guangxi's position and special role in cooperation between Việt Nam and China.

Diên put forth proposals on facilitating goods clearance, ensuring supply chains, expanding agricultural imports from Việt Nam, helping trade promotion activities, and continuing to implement cooperation contents within the framework of bilateral cooperation agreements.

He also proposed the Guangxi side encourage and support businesses of the two countries to diversify their delivery of agricultural products and fruits through the two countries' border gates in order to take advantage of the existing infrastructure, reduce the pressure of goods clearance, avoid the recurrence of import and export congestion at some of the main border gates.

For his part, Liu Ning emphasised Việt Nam's role as Guangxi's largest trading partner over the past 24 years and shared good cooperation results between the two sides over the past time.

Agricultural trade between the two sides reached about US$2.1 billion last year, he said, adding Guangxi businesses participated in many agricultural product trade promotion activities of Việt Nam such as those for Sơn La mango or lychee from the northern provinces of Bắc Giang and Hải Dương.

Liu said he agreed with Diên's proposals and would assign Guangxi departments, sectors, and localities to quickly coordinate with the Vietnamese side to study and implement.

On the same day, Minister Diên and Secretary Liu co-chaired a conference on Việt Nam - China (Guangxi) trade and economic cooperation in the new era.

The conference attracted nearly 300 representatives from state management agencies and businesses of both sides. — VNS