President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky believes that current good indicators of trade turnover between Ukraine and China can be significantly increased, and Ukraine will have something to offer China in terms of exporting high-tech products, products with a high degree of processing and high added value.
“Ukraine has significant potential for cooperation with China in various fields, comparable or even greater than that of many other Eastern European countries. We are interested in the successful realization of this potential. China confidently took the first line in the ranking of our largest trading partners: last year our trade turnover amounted to about $13 billion. And China takes leading positions among the main export partners of Ukraine. I am convinced that the current figures can be significantly increased,” he said in an interview with the Chinese news agency Xinhua.
The President of Ukraine said that Ukraine was one of the first countries to support the initiative of the President of the People’s Republic of China Xi Jinping “One Belt, One Road.”
“Ukraine has a unique geographical location – on the eastern border of the EU, on the way from Asia to Europe, as well as between the Black and Baltic Seas. We have the necessary economic and industrial potential for effective participation in this ambitious project,” he said.
Among the priorities of practical cooperation with China, Zelensky named the credit and investment, agro-industrial, engineering and transport sectors. “Ukraine has significant scientific and educational potential, rich culture. All this provides good opportunities for increasing the volume of trade and economic cooperation, enhancing bilateral humanitarian contacts and exchanges,” he said.
Zelensky said that in order to create better conditions for tourism development, Ukraine introduced a temporary visa-free regime for Chinese tourists from August 1.
“We will continue to try to improve the conditions for mutual trips of citizens of the two countries, so that they have better opportunities to get acquainted with the rich history and culture of Ukraine and China,” he said.
In his opinion, one of the steps towards cultural rapprochement between the two peoples should be the systematic training of specialists in Sinology in Ukraine, and now the Chinese language is being studied at Ukrainian secondary schools and universities, in Ukraine about 500 Sinologists annually receive diplomas of philology, there are qualified translators.
