CHTF opens with wider global participation

Writer: Han Ximin  | Editor: Holly Wang  | From:  | Updated: 2018-11-14

A man works on the flower bed in front of the Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center yesterday, where the 20th China Hi-Tech Fair opens today. Sun Yuchen

Email of the writer: ximhan@126.com

A total of 3,356 exhibitors from 41 countries and international organizations will bring more than 10,000 projects to the 20th China Hi-Tech Fair to be held at the Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center from today to Sunday.

Among the 61 delegations to the fair, a record 31 of them are from countries under the Belt and Road Initiative, according to a news conference with the organizers yesterday.

It is the first time that Chile, Cuba and Peru from Latin America and Caribbean region are attending the fair.

Over the five days, European Union countries including Czech, Sweden, Lithuania and Belgium and other countries such as Bahrain, Russia, Argentina, South Korea and Malaysia will organize activities, such as launchings for new technologies and products, seminars, business promotions, road shows, business matchmaking events and agreement-signing ceremonies, at the fair.

Officials at the minister level or higher from Estonia, Bahrain, Argentina and Malaysia will head their delegations to the fair.

“At this year’s fair, more than 1,000 new products and technologies will be released or launched. The products will demonstrate applications of leading and key technologies in people’s lives, such as new-generation IT, artificial intelligence, Internet + and 5G, aerospace, aviation projects, and construction of smart cities,” Shenzhen Vice Mayor Wang Lixin said at a news conference.

This year’s fair will be divided into six categories including exhibitions, forums, professional conferences, job fairs and auxiliary activities, focusing on the integration of strategic and future industries with the real economy, and the manifestation of new technologies and products in high-end manufacturing, new-generation IT, artificial intelligence, life science, new materials and new-energy fields.

Delegations from 32 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, and 27 well-known universities from the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan will attend the fair.

The forum has invited 70 guests from foreign countries, including Nobel laureates, business executives and well-known scientists, to give speeches on innovation and high-quality development.

CHTF, organized by eight State agencies and the Shenzhen government, has become the largest, most influential and highest-level high-tech exhibition in China through 20 years of development. It will attract 500,000 visitors this year.