Premier Li Keqiang met and talked with overseas participants of the China Development Forum 2016 at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 21. Over 120 people, including leaders from Fortune 500 companies, experts and scholars from international academies and institutions, and representatives from major international organizations and media took part in the meeting.

Questions were raised about China’s reform and opening up, innovation and entrepreneurship, manufacturing development, investment and business environment and Sino-foreign educational cooperation. Participants included President and CEO of Ford Motor Company Mark Fields; Secretary-General of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Angel Gurria; President of Yale University Peter Salovey; Chairman and CEO of Hitachi Hiroaki Nakanishi; Nobel Laureate in Economics and New York University Professor Michael Spence, and American talk show host Charlie Rose. Premier Li addressed all their questions during the meeting.

Premier Li Keqiang meets with overseas participants of the China Development Forum 2016 at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 21.[Photo/Xinhua]

The Premier said that China has achieved remarkable economic and social development achievements in reform and opening-up over the past 30 years and accumulated plenty of development experience. In the future, China will maintain a medium-high economic growth and continue to abide by its reform and opening-up policy. China will strive to promote supply-side structural reform to motivate market vitality and strengthen enterprises’ competitiveness, he added.

The Premier mentioned that we will continue to expand opening-up and welcome foreign investment. All registered enterprises in China, whether domestic or foreign, wholly owned or joint venture, will be treated equally, and a fair and competitive environment will be provided. Moreover, we encourage Chinese students to study abroad for advanced technology and management experience and also welcome overseas students to study in China.

Premier Li emphasized that China is deepening the implementation of an innovation-driven development strategy, vigorously promoting mass innovation and entrepreneurship, and forming the economy’s “twin engines” through developing new economy and fostering new momentum. We will conduct technological innovation to keep up with the pace of innovation in the era of the Internet, Internet of Things and Big Data, and institutional innovation to bring forth new ideas to governmental supervision and create a fair and competitive market environment, the Premier said.

Foreign representatives agreed that through the forum they have gained a more profound understanding of China’s economic development prospects and China’s firm determination to deepen reform and promote economic restructuring and upgrading. They believe that the medium-high growth of China’s economy will have great influence on the world economic growth, and they expressed wishes to deepen cooperation with China and provide support and assistance for China’s development in their respective fields.

State Councilor Yang Jing also took part in the meeting.