Hanoi (VNA) – Substantive cooperation between China and Vietnam aswell as the two countries’ relations are standing before more opportunities than challenges,according to Chinese Ambassador to Vietnam Xiong Bo.

Xiong Bo made the assessment at hisinterview granted to the press on the threshold of the state visit to Vietnamby General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China(CPC) and President of the People's Republic of China Xi Jinping on December12-13.

China and Vietnam have similar politicalregimes, compatible views and ideals, similar development paths, and extensive commoninterests. The cultures of the two countries also have many similarities. Thesefactors are all good conditions, he stressed.

In the new situation, the two sides need tofurther exploit and promote their unique advantages, and promote cooperation instrategic connectivity, and promotion of linkages of the “Belt and Road”initiative and the “Two Corridors, One Belt” framework, he proposed.

The diplomat emphasised the need for thetwo countries to strengthen connectivity, with roads as infrastructure, sea astransportation, aviation as flight connections, and on the internet ase-commerce cooperation, with priority given to cooperation in transportinfrastructure, particularly hard infrastructure such as railways and expressways.

According to Ambassador Xiong Bo, China andVietnam are important trade partners of each other, as China is the Vietnam’slargest, while the latter is also the former’s fourth biggest.

He cited statistics from the General Administrationof Customs of China as saying that in the first 11 months of this year,Vietnam's export turnover to China increased by 3.7% year-on-year, while thetrade deficit decreased by 24.8%.

In ASEAN, Vietnam is the only country thatmaintains growth in exports to China, and China is one of Vietnam’s few exportmarkets that maintains positive growth momentum, the diplomat said, adding thatChina is ready to expand the import of agricultural products, especially fruits,from Vietnam. In the three quarters of this year, the import turnover ofagricultural products from the Southeast Asian nation surged by 160% comparedto the same period last year. Notably, in the first 10 months, China’s import valueof Vietnamese durian hit 1.95 billion USD, far exceeding the set target of 1billion USD set out for the whole year.

The ambassador also shared that recently hemet many Chinese delegations and tourists visiting Vietnam, who said thatVietnamese durian is very delicious, reasonably priced and widely favoured inChina.

In addition, Vietnamese fresh coconut isalso very promising, as China is speeding up procedures as well as consultingon quarantine procedures for the import.

In addition, China's demand for coconutimports continues to increase. Hainan island, the main coconut producer inChina, yields only 250 million coconut fruits per year, while China's annualmarket demand is up to 2.6 billion, excluding 1.5 billion nuts that need tobe processed.

Meanwhile, in Vietnam, there are more than180,000 hectares of agricultural land used to grow coconut, making the countrycurrently rank seventh in the coconut production worldwide.

Currently, coconut growing localities aremaking great efforts to improve product quality. Notably, to export this fruitto China smoothly, businesses have invested in building organic farms. More than 7,000 hectares have been recognised to meet organic standards.

With efforts of farmers and businesses tochange their methods to adapt to export markets, including China, the diplomatexpressed his hope that Vietnam will soon receive a "passport" toexport fresh coconut to the Chinese market./.