Spotlight: Hopes, challenges mingle in China-Russia eastern economic cooperation

The just-concluded Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) will boost the confidence of Chinese businesses in the co-exploration of Russia's Far Eastern regions, but challenges still remain in practical implementation of relevant policies, experts said.

The three-day EEF, which ended Saturday, is an annual event proposed by Russian President Vladimir Putin to speed up the development of eastern Russia and expand multilateral cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region.

Experts said outdated infrastructure and investment shortage still blocked the development of the Far Eastern regions.

Also, considering the differences in legislation, economic environment and mechanism, both China and Russia should join efforts in the coordination of customs and quarantine inspection procedures.

According to the experts, Russia's labor import quota is another problem waiting to be solved, which directly weakens the business conditions of Chinese companies in the country.

However, despite the challenges, participants still depicted a quite promising blueprint of China-Russia cooperation in the Far East's development.

As the largest but less populated region in Russia, the nine Far Eastern federal districts enjoy rich natural resources of mineral, forest, fishing and so on.

The overall economic growth of the region has maintained the speed of 5 percent in recent years, while the industrial growth rate of the Far East has exceeded 4 percent even when the country is currently facing economic difficulties.

Due to these facts, the Russian government took the Far East as one of its development priorities and introduced many supportive policies to attract entrepreneurs and investors.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev, who is also the presidential plenipotentiary envoy to the Far Eastern Federal District, told Xinhua that the government has created a "block of advantages" to speed up the socio-economic development of the Far East region.

The preferential policies include tax breaks, simplification of administrative procedures, and the creation of a single management center.

In July, Putin signed a law to give the Far Eastern city of Vladivostok and 15 other maritime administrative districts the "free port" status, while enterprises that have decided to enter the market would enjoy the benefits in taxation, customs, quarantine inspection and so on.

In a speech at the EEF, Putin promised to take infrastructure and economic development as the top priorities for the Far East's development, while economic freedom and favorable tariff cuts would be provided to domestic and foreign investors.

Meanwhile, Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang, who attended the forum and met with Putin, said the Chinese side always pays great attention to its cooperation with Russia on the development of the Far East.

New cooperation possibilities should be jointly explored in such fields as resource development, processing and manufacturing, and modern agriculture, Wang said.

Backed by official support, China and Russia have reached several cooperation agreements in agricultural production, aerospace and other areas, which showed that markets and production capacity of the two countries could complement each other.

According to Boris Titov, chairman of the Russian part of the China-Russia Friendship Committee for Peace and Development, comprehensive cooperation could also be carried out in areas like energy, wood processing, aquatic production and processing, as well as logistics.

Titov suggested that Chinese companies actively participate in the construction of Vladivostok Free Port, as the project could help increase export of Chinese products, cut down transport time and cost, and bring more opportunities of economic growth for China's northeastern provinces. Endi