Kunming-Bangkok Expressway offers business opportunities
DAI CHUAN
Recently, a team of over 20 business people from the All-China Federation of Taiwan Compatriots travel to Kunming, Fumin, Jinghong, Mohan and other places in Yunnan to explore the business opportunities arising from Kunming-Bangkok Expressway.
Taiwan business people have launched this investigation because they are optimistic about Yunnans unduplicated advantages in implementing the Belt and Road Initiative. Zheng Lizhong, executive vice-president of the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits, said that the ultimate goal of this trip is to encourage Taiwan business people to participate in the Belt and Road initiative, and the industrial connection is a specific entry point.
Given the global economic slowdown, Taiwan business people in Chinese Mainland are also faced with the need of transformation and upgrading. We found that the Belt and Road initiative has brought new market opportunities! a Taiwan businessman said.
How should we perform transformation and upgrading? Should we transform from traditional industries to emerging industries, or move from coastal areas to inland areas? Business practices tell us: we should approach the market. The Belt and Road initiative has opened our eyes, said Ding Kunhua, honorary president of the Association of Taiwan Investment Enterprises on the Mainland and chairman of Tianjin Kaihua Real Estate Development Co., Ltd. According to Ding, Taiwan business people are turning their eyes from coastal areas to the Belt and Road.
The China-ASEAN Free Trade Area, covering 11 countries, is the worlds most populous free trade zone as well as the largest free trade community of developing countries. As China enhance its reform and opening-up, Yunnan is committed to becoming a pivot of the countrys opening up to South and Southeast Asia while bridging between China and ASEAN.
So far, the Association of Taiwan Investment Enterprises on the Mainland has established ten industrial transformation and upgrading bases in the Chinese Mainland. As the intent of this investigation, Taiwan business people expect to set up an industrial transformation and upgrading base in Yunnan so as to transfer the surplus productivity in the coastal areas so that they can look forward to approaching the ASEAN market.
Actually, in Yunnan, the Taiwan business people have gone so far along the Kunming-Bangkok Expressway as to put forward a business pattern in response to the Belt and Road initiative.
Since the establishment of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in October 2014, the interconnectivity infrastructure construction in the countries along the Belt and Road is developing rapidly, bringing great opportunities for trade with and investment in South and Southeast Asian countries. said Chen Jiaxiong, executive vice-president of Kunming Taiwan Compatriots Enterprises Association and chairman of Kunming Unified Biotechnology Co., Ltd. Taiwan business people in Yunnan and Thailand have agreed on terms of cooperation. They are going to build a Kunming-Southeast Asia specialties trading area in Kunming, Thailand-China international trade city in the Chiang Khong Special Economic Zone, Thailand-China commodities wholesale city in Bangkok. Currently, the involved projects have entered the phase of investment invitation.
