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Promoting benefits in Boao Forum for Asia

By Zhou Shixin: 0 Comment(s)Print E-mail China.org.cn, April 13, 2011

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The tenth Boao Forum for Asia conference will be held in Hainan Province from April 14 to 16, 2011, with the theme of "Inclusive Development: Common Agenda and New Challenges." Leaders from a number of Asian nations will attend and discuss how to achieve inclusive development and rejuvenate economic dynamics in the region.

As the first and only regional, annual conference hosted by China, the Boao Forum always keeps up with the latest development trends of Asian and world economic governance. Currently, with the whole world still stuck in economic crisis and only some signs of a slow and fragile recovery, coordination and cooperation among nations to tackle shared economic challenges is becoming more and more urgent.

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Over the last ten years, the Boao Forum organizers have not only gained a lot of experience holding the annual conference, during which representatives in various fields presented different, sometimes competitive perspectives of regional cooperation, but also learned how to coordinate with different national, regional and international organizations so as to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the conference in convening divergent voices into a mainstream paradigm which promotes sustainable economic growth in the near and distant future.

Therefore, the Boao Forum has become a popular regional platform which is always finding new ways to promote common interests, shelve disputes and safeguard respective national interests of participant countries. No participants' interests are harmed if they have similar preferences for boosting their cooperation in various fields. After all, they can not only advance enduring economic development in the process of cooperation with the relevant parties on the principles of equality, mutual benefit and win-win outcomes, but also can enhance mutual understanding and friendship among participating members.

Cooperation in economic fields strengthens political and security confidence. Over the past ten years, the Boao Forum has effectively promoted mutual trust between different parties. For example, with the help of the Forum, China has managed to lessen the uneasiness of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) members over regional integration with outside partners, and strengthened all-round cooperation of ASEAN with China, Japan and other nations in the region. A China-ASEAN free trade agreement was implemented last year, and the ASEAN+3 free trade agreement negotiations have also concluded. Meanwhile, many issues in traditional and non-traditional security fields have also been placed on the agenda, many of which have been discussed and implemented in other regional forums and organizations, such as the ASEAN Regional Forum and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

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