On the morning of May 23, 2005, Chairman Wu Bangguo of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC) of China who was paying an official good-will visit to Australia attended the opening ceremony of China-Australia Economic and Trade Cooperation Forum, delivered a keynote speech entitled Working Together to Open New Opportunities for China-Australia Economic and Trade Cooperation and declared the launch of the first round of negotiations on China-Australia free trade agreement.

In his speech Wu first of all briefly introduced the economic and social progress of China since reform and opening up from the three perspectives of socioeconomic development, the economic system reform and the democracy and legal system construction and then made a comprehensive review of China-Australia relations. He said that the establishment of diplomatic ties between China and Australia in 1972 opened a new chapter of bilateral friendly cooperation. In recent years China-Australia relations have made encouraging progresses. The exchanges between the leaders of the two countries have never been as close as today and the political foundation of bilateral ties keeps consolidating; the contacts between the two peoples have never been as frequent as today which allows the social foundation of the bilateral ties to get increasingly deepened; the bilateral economic and trade cooperation has never been developing as rapid as today, laying down a more solid foundation for bilateral ties. Now is the best period of China-Australia relations.

Talking about China-Australia economic and trade cooperation, Wu pointed out that the two economies have strong complementarities and enjoy great potential of cooperation. The stable social environment, sustained and strong momentum of development, vast market with big potential and rich and skillful labor force of China are generating increasing business opportunities and driving force for the economic growth of various countries including Australia. Australia boasts abundant resources and advanced technologies and has maintained 14 years of rapid economic growth. More encouragingly both sides are posing increasing demands for each other and sharing increasing common interests. Their enthusiasm on cooperation grows unprecedentedly strong and the bilateral economic and trade cooperation is showing unprecedented promise. Both sides should treat and develop the bilateral economic and trade cooperation from a strategic point of view, follow the principle of mutually beneficial and win-win cooperation, make use of their advantages, expand cooperation areas, explore cooperation methods and enrich cooperation content in a bid to raise the mutually beneficial cooperation in economy and trade to new levels. To that end Wu proposed three suggestions: first, to deepen cooperation in energy and mineral resources and realize mutual benefit and a win-win result; second, to expand mutual investment and strengthen cooperation between the businesses of the two countries; third, to improve the cooperation environment and give play to the role of mechanisms. The two sides should work hard to push forward the mutually beneficial cooperation in various fields under the China-Australia trade and economic framework.

The forum is cosponsored by the Chinese Ministry of Commerce and the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Zhang Ruizhen, wife of Chairman Wu Bangguo, Re Di, Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee of NPC and other major accompanying personnel were present at the opening ceremony. More than 300 delegates from the Chinese and Australian government agencies and the business communities of the two countries attended the forum.