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Trade, Education, and Tourism: How Moscow and Beijing Will Develop Cooperation

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Trade, Education, and Tourism: How Moscow and Beijing Will Develop Cooperation

At the end of last year, the mayor of the Russian capital, Sergei Sobyanin, and the head of Beijing, Chen Jining, concluded an agreement on collaboration between Moscow and the Chinese capital. The document will be valid for three years, from 2021 to 2023.

Because of pandemic covid and imposed restrictions the meeting of the officials passed in a virtual format: Sobyanin and Jining discussed the main aspects of the further cooperation within the limits of a video conference of forum "Moscow - Beijing-25: new time - new opportunities". Let's remind that the last was spent in honor of the 25 anniversary of cooperation of Muscovites and the Chinese partners in economy and trade.

Leaders of the two capitals agreed that the basis for their activities will be the exchange of existing experience, as well as the implementation of joint projects in the following sectors:

  • trade;
  • innovative activity;
  • education;
  • urban planning and transport;
  • medicine;
  • Media and mass communications;
  • tourism and culture.


For example, the agreement provides for the preparation of an extensive information base, which will include personal data of experts in various areas of economic activity. The main goal is to exchange accumulated scientific and technical experience, to strengthen the Moscow-Beijing collaboration in the humanities through the exchange of leading teachers, schoolchildren and university students, organization of Russian-Chinese scientific research. In the sphere of the city transport the Moscow-Beijing program of cooperation provides planning of transportations for the Olympic Games which will take place in the capital of China in the winter of 2022 and also maintenance of transport communication. And the leaders of the two capitals decided to share their experience in the prevention and control of the spread of coronavirus infection, in the diagnosis and treatment of covid.

Earlier, in September 2020, an equally important document was signed - an agreement on cooperation between the Moscow Innovation Cluster and the Zhongguancun Science Park. The parties agreed to develop a collaboration in innovation, research and development in advanced areas of economic activity. The execution of this document was one of the practical stages in the implementation of a joint initiative by Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping (President of the People's Republic of China) to develop Russian-Chinese cooperation in science, technology and innovation in 2020-2021.

It should be reminded that the history of interaction between Moscow and Beijing in the key areas of trade, economic and scientific activities goes back to 1995 - that was when the first agreement on this issue was signed (on May 16, 1995).

Vladimir Yefimov, Deputy Mayor of Moscow for Economic and Property Affairs, noted that Moscow industrialists also have strong partnership relations with China. For example, this state accounts for 15.8% of total exports of all goods by Moscow manufacturers. In addition, Chinese companies have invested in the development of the city's economy a total of $ 1 billion.

The official said that in the first nine months of 2020, the volume of non-resource energy exports from the Russian capital to China in terms of money amounted to $ 1.5 billion. This is 40.8% more than it was in January-September 2019.

As for the overall scale of mutual Moscow-China trade turnover, it increased by 10% in 9 months of 2020 relative to the same period of 2019, amounting to 20.5 billion dollars in money equivalent. Of the above-mentioned amount, export transactions from Moscow accounted for $1.46 billion, and imports from the PRC accounted for $19 billion.

In addition to trade relations, the Russian capital has strong investment relations with its Chinese partners. Leading Chinese companies are actively investing their finances in the city's economic development, as a result of which some of them are granted a resident status in special economic zones (SEZs). It gives the business entity tax benefits (profit tax, land tax) and exempts it from customs duties. For example, the SIM-card manufacturer Eastcompeace Technology, or more specifically, its Russian division, Eastcompeace Rus, received such a status in the fall of 2020. The company is located in the Moscow Technopolis, which is one of the best SEZ sites.

Last year was productive not only in strengthening Moscow-Beijing cooperation. So, in November 2020, Sergey Sobyanin signed an agreement on economic cooperation with Rustam Emomali, the head of the capital of Tatarstan, Dushanbe. The document will also be valid for three years. It provides for the exchange of existing experience in various spheres of economic and scientific activities:

  • development of transport infrastructure, road construction, including the development and implementation of a "smart" transport system and virtual modeling of traffic flows;
  • Creation of the effective system of car parking in the cities, transport interchange hubs;
  • organization of refresher courses in Moscow schools for teachers who teach Russian in the capital of Tajikistan;
  • Organization of refresher courses in Moscow hospitals and polyclinics for pediatricians, infectious disease specialists, general practitioners on infectious diseases, for IT specialists of a new profile - telemedicine;
  • organization of international youth festivals.


In addition, the document plans to implement a number of joint Russian-Tajik projects in the following areas:

  • urban transport;
  • beautification of territories and urban construction;
  • development of entrepreneurial activities (especially in the field of trade and services);
  • information and telecommunication technologies;
  • innovation activities and industry;
  • public health;
  • the sphere of sports and youth policy.
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