Minister of Agriculture and the Environment Kimmo Tiilikainen visited China on 20 – 25 March 2016, accompanied by a business delegation of 60 persons, mainly representing the forest, food and cleantech sectors. The main purpose of the visit was to promote the Finnish-Chinese trade relations and a visit to the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and Hong Kong Special Administrative Region was also on the agenda.
Multiple official meetings and business seminars took place, including meeting the Chinese Minister of Forestry, Minister of Water Resources, Minister of Environmental Protection, Minister of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, and Vice-Minister of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.
The other official meetings and business events, included ‘Sino-Finland Wood Summit’ (a Finnish-Chinese meeting on forest affairs), ‘Finland-China District Heating and Waste to Energy Technical Seminar’, and a ‘Food from Finland’ reception.
Topics included the development of agricultural and food trade between Finland and China, cooperation in forest and water resources affairs, and opportunities for Finnish cleantech exports arising from climate change and urbanization.
Minister Tiilikainen expected the China visit to further reinforce the good cooperative relations between Finland and China: “We have a long history of very good and productive cooperation with China. I believe that this visit will further consolidate our bilateral relations as we look into the future with an open mind and search for new partnerships.”
Source: Embassy of Finland, Beijing
