Chinese vision for APEC promotes harmonious environment to deliver global growth: business leader

The Chinese vision for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) in promoting peaceful and prosperous business cooperation helps create the right environment to ensure global stability and deliver growth, said a senior representative from a global hospitality giant.

Lu Haiqing, global vice president of InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) Hotels and Resorts, outlined the need for countries across the region to work together ahead of the upcoming APEC CEO Summit, which opens in the Peruvian capital of Lima on Wednesday.

This year marks the 10th anniversary of Chinese President Xi Jinping's keynote speech at the 2014 APEC summit, during which he offered his vision of the "Asia-Pacific dream", which envisions nations working collaboratively to promote development, sustainability, and peace.

In a recent interview with the China Global Television Network (CGTN) in Shanghai, Lu stressed the importance of communication among countries and businesses to fulfill Xi's vision.

"President Xi launched this idea about 10 years ago. We thought that was a great idea, a great initiative. Business [around] the world, it's like family, you want a harmonious and prosperous environment, the least thing you want is to fight, to disagree. Of course, there are certain disagreements globally, just like family, you have quarrels with your kids all the time, it doesn't you have to get divorced, right? So a lot of times, you talk -- to communicate is always better than stop talking, non-communication," he said.

Lu said that the business community is greatly looking forward to the APEC meeting in Peru, which he said offers the perfect platform to push forward Xi's vision, and hopes all attendees can work to further strengthen regional ties.

"We just hope every responsible global leader could find time to sit down and chat with each other in economy, politics, and similar things like business. We all need to sit down and discuss instead of quarrel, so we look forward to that, we have high hopes about it," said Lu.

Established in 1989, APEC has grown into one of world's largest multilateral trade bodies. Initially composed of twelve members, including the United States, Australia, Japan, and Malaysia, APEC welcomed China in 1991, followed by Peru, Russia, and Vietnam in 1998.

Bringing together around 20,000 participants, including heads of state and dignitaries from 21 member economies across Asia, the Pacific, North America, and South America, APEC aims to foster sustainable economic growth and prosperity in the region.

Chinese vision for APEC promotes harmonious environment to deliver global growth: business leader

Seven of the eight major categories of commodities and services that make up China's consumer price index (CPI) have risen in March, said an analyst after the country's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) released the latest data on Friday.

The latest data showed China's CPI, a main gauge of inflation, rose 1 percent year on year in March, and the core CPI, which excludes food and energy prices, increased 1.1 percent year on year.

Among them, prices of industrial consumer goods grew by 2.2 percent, an increase of 1.1 percentage points from the previous month, contributing about 0.67 percentage points to the year-on-year CPI increase.

Specifically, the prices of gold jewelry, household appliances and clothing all went up, while gasoline prices turned from a decline to a rise.

"Of the eight major categories of commodities and services that make up the CPI, seven recorded price increases and one saw a decline, namely the residential category. Specifically, driven by strong seasonal demand, a rise in clothing prices pushed up the overall price of the apparel category year on year. The price of the transportation and communication category shifted from a decline to a year-on-year increase. Meanwhile, boosted by growing resident travel demand, prices for travel agency services also rose year on year," said He Xiaoying, deputy director at the analysis and forecasting division of the price monitoring center under the National Development and Reform Commission.

Friday's data also showed that the producer price index (PPI), which measures costs for goods at the factory gate, returned to year-on-year growth in March, ending a 41-month streak of decline.

The PPI rose 0.5 percent year on year in March, reversing a 0.9 percent drop in February, according to the NBS.

NBS statistician Dong Lijuan attributed the turnaround mainly to imported inflationary pressures and improved supply-demand dynamics in some domestic industries.

Peng Xiaozhen, an analyst at Sublime China Information Company Limited, an institute specializing in providing information on Chinese commodity market, said overall, China's PPI is set to recover.

"International energy markets experienced wide fluctuations, and rising costs pushed up prices across the entire petrochemical industrial chain. Boosted by higher energy and chemical product prices, the rebound trend of China's PPI was further consolidated and overall, its recovery is going to continue," said Peng.

Price hike of seven major categories drives China's CPI in March: analyst