Yan Aoshuang, Vice Chair of the Standing Committee of the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress Meets with the Delegation of the National Conference of State Legislatures, USA

The 7-person delegation of the National Conference of State Legislatures, USA, headed by Marc Pacheco, president pro tempore of Massachusetts State Senate, at the invitation of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, visited China from October 30 to November 6, 2019. On the afternoon of November 4, Yan Aoshuang, vice chair of the Standing Committee of the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress met with the delegation.

Vice chair Yan Aoshuang firstly reviewed the exchanges between the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress and the National Conference of State Legislatures, USA, and briefly introduced the social development of Beijing and the functions of the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress. According to her, local exchanges and cooperation of the two countries maintained a positive momentum. The Beijing Municipal People’s Congress is willing to conduct extensive cooperation with the American legislation circle including the National Conference of State Legislatures, USA. Targeting fields to American counterpart’s interest, she mainly introduced the policies and measures made by Beijing in deepening industrial restructuring, reduction and intensive development, optimization of business environment, development of clean energy, and promotion of supply side reform. She pointed out that the constantly upgraded consumption market in China will bring broad prospect for American enterprises that provide quality products and convenient services. She encouraged more excellent American enterprises to settle in China and get more involved in the Chinese market. Vice chair Yan Aoshuang also mentioned that openness and integration are correct direction for the bilateral relationship, and they should unswervingly advance and deepen fields for cooperation of both parties in the spirit of cooperation and mutual benefits. She believed that the prospect of China-America exchange and cooperation will be brighter.

Marc Pacheco, the president pro tempore, said that in the context of globalization, China-America cooperation can benefit both countries and the rest of the world. This is his first visit to the Chinese mainland and he is amazed by the excellent achievements of China in high-tech development, environment protection and information technologies. He mentioned the opportunities and challenges shared by China and America as big countries, and he hoped that both sides can have mechanism-based exchange and cooperation in fields such as students and professionals exchange, enterprise cooperation discussion, public policies and application standard formulation, technology R&D, climate changes countermeasures, and best practices promotions, etc. He also suggested the establishment of clean energy summit mechanism that includes stakeholders such as high-tech enterprises, R&D institutions and policymakers to bring positive changes to both countries and even the international community. David Sokola, member of the delegation and state senator of Delaware Legislature, said that he once visited Beijing in 2014 and he can notice that Beijing’s air quality has been greatly improved for the past five years. He greatly admired the resolution and forceful measures taken by the Beijing government in environment improvement. Kevin Thompson, member of the delegation and director of Public Affairs and Government Relations at Walmart, spoke of the raid development of the company in China for the past two decades, which brought tangible benefits to American consumers and introduced advanced experience in China’s market delivery and logistics system to America.

Established in 1975, headquartered in Denver, Colorado, National Conference of State Legislatures of USA is a state legislature organization participated by the Democratic Party and the Republican Party with members including tens of thousands of state senators and assistants to senators in America. The organization is dedicated to improving the governance decision-making administrative capacity of senators and their assistants and promoting the quality and efficiency of legislation in each state. With major influence in local political circles in America, it is an important platform to promote communication among state senators and connect the state parliaments and federal governments.

Zhang Qian, executive vice president of the BPAFFC, Zhu Qiuzheng, deputy secretary-general of the Standing Committee of the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress, deputy director general of the General Office and director general of Foreign Affairs Office of the General Office, Chen Jingpu, vice chairman of Finance and Economic Committee of the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress and director general of Budgetary Affairs Commission, Ren Peiwen, deputy director general of the Office of Education, Science, Culture, Health and Sports of the Standing Committee of the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress, Xu Fenghua, deputy inspector of Department of American & Oceanian Affairs of CPAFFC were present.