The 10th UK-China Economic and Financial Dialogue held in London, cooperation in agriculture is a priority

The UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer and Chinese Vice-Premier Hu Chunhua concluded the 10th UK-China Economic and Financial Dialogue on 17 June 2019, in London. The two sides reached a series of new agreements on deepening economic and financial cooperation. Building on this, both sides committed to continue to strengthen the mechanism to support the further development of a "Golden Era" of UK-China relations. The clause 59 of the Policy Outcome outlined the priority areas and mechanisms for agricultural cooperation:

Both sides are ready to further strengthen cooperation in rural development, agriculture green development, and farmers’ cooperative organisations. Particularly promoting policy, technology, and personnel exchange in such areas as rural development planning, infrastructure development, agri-tourism and eco-friendly agriculture. Both sides are ready to further strengthen science and technology cooperation in agriculture, with the support of the China-UK Sustainable Agricultural Innovation Network (SAIN) and encourage more agricultural research and educational institutions to conduct collaborative research in advanced agricultural technologies, so as to deliver stronger science and technology support to agricultural development.

The other agriculture related outcomes include:

both sides welcome the signing of the protocol for the export of UK beef to China, with a view to approving beef export to China by the end of 2019;

China agrees to send experts to the UK to carry out technical exchanges on scrapie by autumn 2019, in order to study and formulate evaluation criteria for ban-lifting on UK lamb exports;

both sides agree to continue to promote the lifting of the Avian Influenza ban on British poultry and poultry products;

both sides welcomes the recent approval and registration of UK pork plants, and look forward to further approval of qualified UK pork plants by the end of the 2019, to enable exports based on market demand;

the importance of supporting role that science and technology plays in socio-economic development, through the UK-China Joint Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation Cooperation, launched in 2017 and are willing to further implement the Joint Strategy together, including the Agri-tech and Healthy Ageing Flagship Challenges;

both sides are satisfied with the cooperation on the agriculture remote sensing projects, and agree to consider signing an MoU between the China National Space Administration and the Science and Technology Facilities Council on Cooperation in the Space Science Activities.

The full text of the Policy Dialogue Outcome is available at: https://bit.ly/2WQt4jO