Leaders from Latin America and Caribbean States have expressed hope that an upcoming forum on cooperation with China will take bilateral ties to a new level.
The first ministerial meeting of China and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States Forum opens later on today in Beijing.
Equator President Rafael Correa says China's financial support to Latin America is a win-win measure.
"We all know that there are many profitable projects in Latin America, meaning we have the ability of paying back. But for countries under the developing stage like us, lack of funding is our bottleneck. China can provide those funds, meaning it's a win-win measure. Nations of the Community could make good use of the funds provided by China by implementing more feasible projects."
Cooperation between the two sides covers a broad range of fields including technology, education, infrastructure, finance, and investment.
Over the past decade, trade between China and Latin America has maintained a formidable annual growth rate of 30 percent and trade volume between the two sides increased 20 fold to more than 260 billion U.S. dollars.
Last July, during a China-CELAC forum in Brazil, Presdent Xi Jinping announced that China will provide a 10 billion U.S. dollars loan for nations in the Community of Latin American and Carribbean States.
A Chinese-Latin American cooperation fund of 5 billion U.S. dollars was also launched.
Costa Rica President Luis Guillermo Solis says that the establishment of the forum is a certain consequence of a new global situation and structure, and Latin American countries should further enhance cooperation with countries along the Pacific Ocean, including China.
Echoing this point, Dr. Ronnie Lins de Almeida with Brazilian think tank Getulio Vargas Foundation says the meeting carries far-reaching significance.
"The meeting is not only a key step in pushing forward the dialogue and cooperation between China and the Latin American and Caribbean countries, it also means to raise the voice of developing nations in global decision-making. This can only be done with the increasing high-level visits between the two sides and an enhanced South-South dialogue, based on the long-standing friendship between China and CELAC countries."
The forum is expected to conclude with the Beijing Declaration, a 2015-2019 China-CELAC Plan of Cooperation.
