EU and China start high-level economic dialogue

28 April 2008

The European Commission and the Chinese government launched the EU-China High-Level Economic and Trade Dialogue Mechanism in Beijing. Proposed by the Chinese authorities and agreed at last year's EU-China summit, the mechanism aims to ease trade tensions and enhance cooperation.

 

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso led an EU delegation to China of nine European Commissioners. In addition to trade, discussions focus on climate change, food safety and sustainable development. The two sides agreed on an ambitious and far-reaching remit for the dialogue and began focused discussions.

 

During two afternoon sessions, first exchanges covered trade and investment cooperation, balanced economic development, innovation and technology transfer and international economic development. There were then more focussed discussions on Energy issues, trade in high-tech, Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) protection, and trade facilitation.

 

In future the mechanism will also tackle market access, transport, regulatory issues and standards.

 

Press release

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