Second round of Moldovan-Chinese talks on Free Trade Agreement to take place in Beijing

Chisinau, 20 July /MOLDPRES/ - The second round of the negotiations on the Free Trade Agreement between Moldova and China will be held in Beijing on 22-27 July. The government today approved the nominal composition of the Moldovan delegation due to hold talks in the Chinese capital. The delegation will be led by the state secretary at the Economics and Infrastructure Ministry, Iuliana Dragalin.   

The first round of negotiations for the working out and signing of the Free Trade Agreement between Moldova and China took place on in Chisinau on 5-6 March.   

The participants in the first round discussed legal aspects of the future Agreement, as well as the fields of enforcement, among which the trade with goods, removing customs duties and technical barriers to trade, customs administration, competition, medical services and sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures.

The signing of the Free Trade Agreement with China will help strengthen the commercial and economic relations between both states, will facilitate the access of Moldovan goods on the Chinese market, will attract investments in the main activity sectors of Moldova, the state secretary at the Economics and Infrastructure Ministry, Iuliana Dragalin, said after the talks.  

Earlier, a feasibility study was carried out jointly with the Chinese side on the opportuneness of launching and eventually signing the Agreement. According to the study’s estimations, Moldova’s exports to China might increase by 39.85 per cent and the Gross Domestic Product might grow by 0.42 per cent.  

The signing of a Free trade Agreement between Moldova and China was backed by the participants in the Moldovan-Chinese commission for commercial and economic cooperation and the Moldovan-Chinese business forum, held in Chisinau in December 2016.  

Official data shows that 84 companies with Chinese capital worth about 5 million lei work in Moldova. Data by the National Statistics Bureau shows that the Moldovan exports to the Chinese market in 2017 grew by 30.9 per cent and the imports – by 26.4 per cent. China last year was on the fifth position in a ranking of ten countries from which Moldova buys goods, with an import figure of 505 million dollars.   

Wines, grapes, optic instruments, furniture represents the biggest share of the Moldovan export to China, while chemical products and metal articles predominate in the structure of imports.   

(Reporter V. Bercu, editor L. Alcaza)