Malaysia is looking forward to forging more bilateral cooperation with China in the area of digital economy in order to improve the income of the people and reduce the cost of living.
Malaysian Embassy Chargé d’Affaires in China S. Sanmugam said Malaysia and other Association od Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) countries can learn a lot from the republic, specifically in the area of digital economy, because it has a greater number of resources for research and and development in the field of digital economics.
“The trade between Malaysia and China has reached more than US$200 billion last year and during Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim‘s visit to China in April this year, a lot of Chinese entrepreneurs were drawn into investing in Malaysia and during the visit, he (Anwar) had secured RM170 billion in potential investments for Malaysia.
“This is one of the success that Prime Minister has achieved on his visit to China. Following that visit, we have had many ministers who have made follow-up visits to China and made additional deals in many sectors, including tourism and agriculture,” he said at Asean Day Celebration 2023 at Malaysia’s Embassy in Beijing.
Sanmugam said both Asean countries and China also could intensify people-to-people exchanges to strengthen cross-cultural connections in the region since China fully reopened its borders to foreign travellers last March.
“With regard to student exchanges, since the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak, we have not had many student exchanges between Asean countries and China, but now many of our Malaysian students are returning to China to continue their studies.
“The students also hosted a silat exhibition today in conjunction with the Asean Day celebration, showcasing the richness of culture and the unity between the association’s member states.”
He is optimistic that the good relations and cooperation between China and Asean member states will continue to grow over the next 50 years in many areas despite certain areas of contention – such as that of the South China Sea.
“I believe dialogue, conversation and cooperations with neighbouring countries can always solve problems… we have a lot of positive elements of conversations, dialogue, cooperations, partnerships, these are the things that we have to look forward to.”
