China-Finland Agriculture Forum held in Helsinki
DATE:2014-11-20 SOURCE:MOA
The China-Finland Agriculture Forum was held in Helsinki, Finland on Nov. 18, 2014. Vice Minister Niu Dun and Mr. Petteri Orpo, Minister of Agriculture and Forestry of Finland attended and addressed the opening ceremony.
Niu noted that the Chinese government has always attached great importance to agricultural development, adopted agriculture-related issues as the top priority in all its work, and listed safeguarding national food security and increasing farmers'' income as the primary task of agricultural and rural undertakings.
In 2013, China''s grain output exceeded 600 million tons, achieving 10 consecutive years of rising grain harvests. And in 2014, the grain production has also maintained a good momentum.
Since the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and Finland, the two sides have made constant progress in agricultural cooperation. The Chinese side is keen to work with the Finish side to beef up cooperation in such areas like agricultural technologies and equipments, agro-product quality & safety, ecological agriculture, agricultural investment and trade, and so on.
Minister Petteri Orpo spoke highly of the progress in China-Finland agricultural cooperation over recent years. He expressed the readiness of Finland to strengthen collaboration with China and build the "China-Finland Cooperation Platformof Agricultural Development and Innovation", to underpin the implementation of four demonstration projects on farm machinery, oat production & processing, dairy industry and biomass energy in Hebei Province of China in the following two years.
About 80 delegates participated in the Forum, including agricultural officials, experts and business people from both countries. Thirteen experts and representatives of enterprises conducted in-depth discussion on five agenda items covering agro-product quality & safety, protected agriculture, agricultural information, agricultural mechanization and biomass energy.
Earlier the same day, with the witness of leaders of the two countries, Vice Minister Niu Dun and Minister Petteri Orpo signed the "2015-2016 Action Plan on China-Finland Agricultural Cooperation", and addressed the China-Finland Trade & Economic Forum.