The Meeting adopted Nanning Statement with the topic of Cooperation in Product Quality and Safety, Press Release and TBT/MOU Implementation Program for 2012-2013.
Deputy Minister of Science and Technology Tran Viet Thanh led the Vietnamese delegation to participate in this Meeting. With the role of a coordinating country for cooperative relations between ASEAN and Chine in terms of standards, technical specifications and appropriateness assessment, Vietnam has been highly appreciated by Mr. Surin Pitsuwan, ASEAN General Secretary for its efforts to prepare for this Conference. Mr. Zhi Shuping, Minister in charge of Chines Administration for Quality Supervision and Investigation and Quarantine(AQSIQ) thanked for Vietnam’s coordination, which helped the Conference to be successful.
The Meeting initiated the official establishment of ASEAN –China Cooperation Mechanism for TBT issues. This was the beginning of consultations between ASEAN and China through regular meetings as meetings of TBT/MOU focal points to be organized at least once a year – which are often next to a meeting of ASEAN Consulting Committee on Standards and Quality(ACCSQ) to be organized every two years in turn in ASEAN countries; the Ministerial meeting on TBT Cooperation to be organized every twoyears and meetings with working groups in fields of common interests of the two parties. Within this cooperation framework, the two parties would exchange information in fields to be prioritized for cooperation, joint studies, organizations of conferences, workshops and forums to share information among countries and organizations of training courses in order to support countries as Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia to integrate with remaining countries in terms of TBT issues.
The information sharing included information of laws on standards and specifications, metrological jurisdiction, verification, experiment, recognition and certification of products, quality and safety in fields as cosmetics, pharmacy, herbal medicines and functional food, automobiles, electricity, electronics, rubbers…
Through the mechanism of information exchanging within the framework of ASEAN –China Cooperation in TBT, Vietnam can quickly study and solve issues relating to technical barriers to trade through focal points provided by ASEAN countries and China. Issues arisen about technical barriers to trade between ASEAN and China could be exchanged, discussed and solutions could be found out within this cooperation framework.
During the time the Ministerial-level meeting, in Nanning, series of events were organized as the 8thASEAN –China Summit Conference on business and investment; forum on finance and investment; the 8th ASEAN – China exhibition on imported and exported products; the 4thASEAN – China strategic dialogues; ASEAN –China forum on family and population; ASEAN – China forum of entertainment industry 2011; the international folk music festival…