More Chinese investment expected in Poland

Source: CNTV

Business leaders from more than 80 Polish companies are visiting Shanghai with their newly-elected president. President Andrzej Duda will attend the fourth leaders' meeting between China and countries from central and eastern Europe today. And on Monday, the companies were at a China-Poland economic forum.
Poland is the only co-founder of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank from Central and Eastern Europe. Its involvement is a sign of its ties with China.
"We want to be a hub not for Chinese trade to Central and East Europe, that's not enough; we'd like to be a transfer hub, for the trade of China with its greatest trading partner, which is European Union, in various dimensions of the vision, economic, logistical, transport, and political," said Slawomir Majman, president of the Polish Information & Foreign Investment Agency.
To begin with, Poland has made great efforts for boosting its cargo train logistics between China, Poland and Europe.
"We're operating with our Chinese partners in Chengdu, Sichuan, and we're now opening our new joint venture with our partners in Beijing," said Tomasz Grzelak, CEO of Htrans Logistics.
A widening trade deficit partly explains the need to increase the movement of cargo.
"There is the statistics of the (trade) balance between Poland and China economic exchange, but it's still very different. It's 1 to 10. But we hope the cargo trains are the new solution for our market," Grzelak said.

Poland has been described as the third best place worldwide for manufacturing projects and the second best location in Eastern Europe for revenue opportunities. But it has attracted less than US$90 million of investment from China.
China is the source of more than 10 percent of Poland's imports, but it contributes less than 0.2 percent of foreign investment in Poland. As China seeks to create a 21st century Silk Road, Poland needs to consider how to increase its exposure to the Chinese market, in a more active way.

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