英国威尔士议会政府经济部长访渝希望与重庆在汽车、航空、文创等领域合作

2017年2月20日，威尔士政府经济部长肯·斯凯特出席第十一届重庆威尔士周活动。 摄影/熊怡

“重庆近年来发展迅猛，在汽车、旅游、信息产业等领域取得了重大进展，这些也是威尔士的重点发展产业。”2017年2月20日，英国威尔士议会政府经济和基础设施内阁部长肯·斯盖茨（Ken Skates）首次到访重庆，并出席第十一届重庆威尔士周相关活动。肯·斯盖茨表示，重庆和威尔士建立友好关系已经11年，希望进一步增进威尔士与重庆在经贸领域的深度合作，深化彼此的信任和理解，助推双方工商界的合作与交流，推动双方经贸信息更加积极有效地互通。

“威尔士和中国的友谊持续升温，我们驻重庆、北京、上海的办公室也与当地政府建立了紧密的友好合作关系，我们还希望借助中国中央政府和中国驻伦敦大使馆将这一关系推上一个更高的台阶。”肯·斯盖茨表示，近年来，威尔士和中国的贸易合作日益紧密，中国投资者也越来越关注威尔士的投资环境。继英国脱欧以后，威尔士更加重视和中国友好关系。目前，有超过4500名中国留学生在威尔士学习，威尔士已落成3所孔子学院，分别在卡迪夫、班戈、兰彼得。“威尔士具有开放的商务环境，在汽车、旅游、信息产业等领域有着良好的发展态势。此外，威尔士的创意产业仅次于伦敦位居英国第二。”肯·斯盖茨说。

“我认为，两个城市或地区之间应遵从‘先交朋友，再做生意’的原则。”肯·斯盖茨认为，重庆作为中国西部地区唯一的中央直辖市，近年来经济发展令人瞩目，重庆和威尔士建立友好关系11年来，也让两地在文化、社会和经济等领域合作交流密切。他特别提出，希望威尔士在汽车制造、航空航天、数码电子、文化创意等领域与重庆开展合作项目。

肯·斯盖茨此行与重庆市商务委员会、市文化委员会等部门举行了一系列重要会议，会见了有前往英国、特别是威尔士投资意向的中国工商界精英。并与市体育局讨论确定开展重庆与威尔士青少年足球培训项目，为重庆职业和业余青年足球运动员提供威尔士丰富的足球资源，并通过两地的足球运动员互访，进行学习交流和培训。

■编辑：熊怡

Welsh Government Cabinet Secretary for Economy Visited Chongqing Hoping to Cooperate with Chongqing in Extensive Fields Including Automobile, Aerospace and Cultural Creativity

2017 Wales Week Reception. Photographer/Xiong Yi

“With rapid development, Chongqing has made significant progress in extensive fields including automobile, tourism and information industry in recent years. These fields are also the key development industries of Wales.” Ken Skates, Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Infrastructure in the Welsh Government paid his first visit to Chongqing on February 20, 2017. During his visit, he attended the related activities of 2017 Wales Week in Chongqing. Ken Skates said that Chongqing had established friendly relationship with Wales for 11 years, and he hoped to further promote the cooperation between Wales and Chongqing in the field of trade and economy, enhance mutual understanding and trust, boost the business cooperation and exchanges between both parties and encourage the positive and effective communication about trade and economy.

“The friendship between Wales and China keeps deepening,and the Welsh Government Offices in Chongqing, Beijing and Shanghai have established close relations of friendly cooperation with local government. We hope to drive the relations toward a higher level with the support of the Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese Embassy in

London.” Ken Skates said that the trade cooperation between Wales and China were getting increasingly close in the recent years. On the one hand, Chinese investors increasingly focused on the investment environment in Wales. On the other hand,after Brexit, Wales paid more attention to the friendly relationship with China. At present, more than 4,500 Chinese overseas students study in Wales, and three Confucius Institutes have been established in Cardiff, Bangor, Lampeter respectively. “Wales has opened business environment and good momentum of development in fields like automobile, tourism, information industry.In addition, the creative industry of Wales comes second in the UK only to London.”

“I hold that the exchanges between two cities or two regions should follow the principle of making friend before doing business.” Ken Skates said that Chongqing, as the only municipality directly under the Central Government in the western region of China, had made great achievements in economic development. Since Chongqing established friendly friendship with Wales 11 years ago, the cooperation and exchanges between two parties have been close in fields including culture, society and economy. He specifically proposed the idea that Wales could carry out cooperation projects with Chongqing in fields including automobile manufacturing,aerospace, digital electronic industry and cultural creativity.

During the visit, Ken Skates held a series of important meetings with departments like Chongqing Municipal Business Committee and Chongqing Municipal Culture Commission and met China’s business elites who had the intention to invest in the UK, especially in Wales. Besides, he discussed with Chongqing Municipal Sports Bureau about developing a youth football training program between Chongqing and Wales. The program would provide rich football resources from Wales for professional and amateur young football players in Chongqing and promote studies, exchanges and trainings by exchanged visits of football players of both regions.

■ Editor: Xiong Yi

Tr. by He Yufang