Chinese and South African enterprises signed letters of intent (LOIs) on cooperation across multiple sectors at the China-South Africa Economic and Trade Cooperation Forum held in Cape Town on Friday.
The forum was co-hosted by the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) and the South African Department of Trade, Industry and Competition. More than 350 representatives from both China and South Africa attended the event.
Ren Hongbin, president of the CCPIT, presided over the opening ceremony of the forum, saying that he looks forward to working with South African partners to build high-quality economic and trade platforms and provide better professional services, so as to make new contributions to promoting more fruitful, mutually beneficial cooperation between China and South Africa, as well as between China and Africa.
During the forum, business representatives from both sides conducted matchmaking and consultations on cooperation in such field as agriculture, manufacturing, energy and minerals, finance, automotive, and logistics, signing a number of LOIs.
"Particularly against the backdrop of South Africa's current energy transition and industrial upgrading, Chinese enterprises can provide targeted solutions. This 'tailor-made cooperation' also makes projects more sustainable," said Tang Yingchu, a business representative from China.
Chinese, South African enterprises sign letters of intent on cooperation at forum in Cape Town
A total of 12 group standards for connected vehicles in two areas -- collaborative intelligent connected vehicles based on advanced mobile telecommunication" and "intelligent driving on complex roads" -- were officially released at an industry conference in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, on Saturday.
The standards were issued by the China Association of Automation in collaboration with Central South University and 10 other universities and research institutions. These standards convert achievements from national key research and development programs, including "vehicle-road-cloud integration," into a series of group standards. This initiative fills critical gaps in standards for cooperative driving testing and decision-making on complex roads.
"First, we standardize industry order and unify technology and testing standards to break the bottleneck of enterprises competing individually, promoting orderly development of the industry. Second, we accelerate technology transformation by creating bridges for innovation and implementation, which will lower R and D costs for enterprises and consolidate the foundation for industry growth. Third, we empower new quality productive forces, promote the integration of multiple industries, drive upgrades in the industrial chain, and support the construction of a modern industrial system. In the meantime, we also improve the standard collaboration framework to help the industry engage in international competition," said Hou Zengguang, vice president of the Chinese Association of Automation and professor at the Institute of Automation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
The two-day national conference on new quality productive forces and intelligent industry development concluded on Saturday.
China releases group standards for intelligent connected vehicles
