Continued bilateral trade benefits China and US: Minister

The Chinese government will continue to build mutually beneficial and complementary economic and trade relations with the United States, with a goal to generate more benefits for both peoples, the minister of commerce said on Saturday.

Minister Zhong Shan said he was looking forward to meeting with the US commerce secretary.

"Wilbur L. Ross is an outstanding entrepreneur and negotiator. I am willing to work with great people, because they are always far-sighted with strategic thinking," Zhong said at a press conference during the annual session of the National People’s Congress.

Sino-US economic and trade cooperation is very much in the interest of both countries, Zhong said. "A trade war does not meet the fundamental interests of the two countries, neither the two peoples. It will be a disaster for the global economy,” he added.

Zhong noted that China and the United States are mutually reliant and very important to each other.

He took the case of export statistics in the last decade, when US exports to China grew “much faster” than those from China to the US - the average annual growth of US exports to China stood at 11 percent, while China's annual growth rate of US exports was 6.6 percent.

For example, the US exported 26 percent of its Boeing aircraft and 56 percent of soybeans to China, as well as 16 percent of vehicles and 15 percent of integrated circuits.

Cooperation is the only right choice between the world’s two largest economies, Zhong said, citing what China’s President Xi Jinping underscored in a previous call with US President Donald Trump.

Since the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two sides, Sino-US economic and trade relations have been developing in the right direction, Zhong added.

Data shows both trade and investment volume have notably surged.

In 2016, the volume of commodity trade between China and the US reached $519.6 billion - 207 times higher than in 1979 when bilateral diplomatic relations were established. In the same period, bilateral service trade exceeded $110 billion and two-way investment amounted to $170 billion.