China-Italy Entrepreneur Symposium was held in Rome on October 7, local time. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi attended the symposium and delivered a speech respectively. Chinese Commerce Minister Chen Deming, Italian Minister of Economic Development Romani and Vice Minister Urso addressed the symposium.

Chen stated that China-Italy trade and economic cooperation had good tradition, solid foundation and broad prospect. Since 2010, bilateral trade has greatly recovered and was expected to reach the goal of US$40 billion proposed by the premiers of the two countries. Next, the two parties will devote themselves to doubling bilateral trade value in the following 5 years. Besides, there is strong complementarity in the investment and cooperation between the two countries. China encourages and supports Chinese and Italian companies to expand their investment and cooperation in the fields of hi-tech, energy-saving, environmental protection, and creative design.

Chen said that China was striving to transform its mode of the economic development and actively expanding its domestic demand, which provided opportunities for China-Italy trade and economic cooperation. Chen also hoped companies of the two countries could enhance the communication, explore opportunities and expand the mutual cooperation so as to inject new vigor for the development of bilateral trade and economic relations.

Romani stated that the Italian government attached great importance to the development of bilateral trade and economic relations and regarded China as the huge opportunity. Italy would like to take joint efforts with China to further promote the communication among the enterprises of the two countries and the development of bilateral trade and economic relations.

Urso said that Italy-China relations developed smoothly, bilateral trade and economic cooperation kept the rapid growth with great achievements reached in various fields. At present, there were many Chinese companies with effective investment and cooperation in Italy. And Italy will create more convenient environment to welcome more Chinese companies to invest in Italy.

Representatives addressing the symposium were from China Development Bank, Shanghai Electric Group, Zoomlion, Italian Industrial Association, Italy-China Foundation and Ermenegildo Zegna Group.

After the symposium, witnessed by the premiers of the two countries, relevant institutions and enterprises of the two countries signed 10 cooperation projects with the total value of about US$3.26 billion, covering new energy, sea water desalinization, info-communications, financial cooperation, trade in marble, etc.

This symposium was co-sponsored by the Ministry of Commerce of China and the Ministry of Economic Development of Italy. More than 100 participants were officials of the two governments and representatives from financial institutions and enterprises of the two countries.

Currently, Italy is China’s fifth largest trading partner in the EU, the fifth largest source country in direct investment, and the third largest source country in technology import. And China is Italian first largest trading partner in Asia. In the first 8 months of 2010, China-Italy bilateral trade value amounted to US$28.54 billion, with a year-on-year growth of 40.9%; the value of contacted investment in China sharply increase by 136.48% year on year. By the end of August, Italian actual investment in China reached US$4.925 billion.