USSEC representatives attended the China International Fair for Trade In Service (CIFTIS) in Beijing from May 28 to June 1 as part of USSEC’s ongoing efforts to promote sustainable U.S. Soy to Chinese regulators and policy influencers.
Rosalind Leeck, USSEC Senior Director – Market Access, attended the Global Green Economy Prosperity Forum 2019 on May 31. The Forum is an essential component of CIFTIS and aims to facilitate global cooperation in sustainability, agriculture, climate change, and energy. Ms. Leeck spoke to an audience comprised of senior government officials in charge of agriculture, climate change, and environmental protection, as well as to industry representatives from agriculture, green economy, and energy sectors from a dozen countries including China, the United Arab Emirates, Israel, Pakistan, South Korea, and Canada. She began her presentation by saying that sustainability is one of the topics that transcends national borders and concerns everyone in the world, and elaborated on the advantages of U.S. Soy and how its sustainable production and supply contributes to China’s food security goals.

As a key component of the Forum, USSEC and the host, International Green Economy Association (IGEA), signed an MOU on China – U.S. Sustainable Aquaculture Cooperation Mechanism, making aquaculture cooperation potentially the earliest area to be materialized in the future under the China – U.S. Sustainable Agriculture Cooperation Framework established on the same occasion. IGEA is a member of the UN Economic & Social Council and the UN Global Contract Organization.

Before the Forum started, keynote speakers and government dignitaries visited the USSEC booth. Chinese Ambassador Sha Zukang, former UN Under Secretary-General, and Mr. Yin Chengjie, Senior Counsellor of the State Council and former Vice Minister of Agriculture, talked with USSEC staff to obtain fresh knowledge about the In-Pond Raceway System (IPRS) and the Sustainable Soybean Assurance Protocol (SSAP), which were demonstrated through scale models replicating the real-life systems.

On June 1, USSEC co-sponsored a breakout session on Sustainable Agriculture and Corporate Social Responsibility, together with International Green Economy Association. Among the speakers and discussion panelists were Mr. Wei Baigang, Director General of the Development Planning Department under the Ministry of Agricultural and Rural Affairs, in charge of sustainable agriculture development; Ms. Leeck; Wang Zhaokai, academician of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, aquaculture expert; Yang Jiudong, Director of Agricultural Development, Farmers’ Daily; Wang Jinwen, Vice President of Charoen Pokphand (CP) Group in China; Zhang Fan, Senior Official from aquaculture feed producer Tongfan Co., Ltd. USSEC Regional Director – Greater China Zhang Xiaoping moderated the discussion on sustainable agriculture and how it relates to the corporate social responsibility of companies in the agriculture sector.

The China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) has been held since 2012. It is the only comprehensive platform for trade in services approved by China’s State Council and co-sponsored by the Ministry of Commerce and Beijing Municipal Government. In addition, the World Trade Organization and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development and Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development are the permanent supporting organizations for CIFTIS. Earlier this year, CIFTIS was elevated as one of China’s top three international trade events directly supervised by the Chinese State Council, alongside the China International Import Expo (CIIE) in Shanghai and the China Import & Export Fair (CIEF) in Guangzhou, making it more important than ever.