Venezuelan President Maduro Meets with Chinese Business Delegation Headed by Liang Wengen

Caracas, Venezuela - August 7, 2015 (by people.cn reporter Wu Zhihua) - On the evening of August 6, local time, Venezuelan President Maduro met with a Chinese business delegation headed by Sany Group Chairman Liang Wengen in the Palacio de Miraflores. Also present at the meeting were the Venezuelan Vice-President of the Council of Ministers and Minister of Finance Rodolfo Marco Torres, Vice-President of the Council of Ministers and Minister of Planning Ricardo José Menéndez Prieto, the Chinese ambassador to Venezuela Zhao Bentang, and others.

During the meeting, President Maduro spoke of the favorable conditions in Venezuela for the promotion of a great many cooperative projects between China and Venezuela. With the support of China and other friendly nations, Venezuela will promote the development of the national economy.

President Maduro said that the Venezuelan domestic market has been growing in the past few years, and the people have stable jobs and enjoy rights to education, housing, and healthcare. The most important thing is that Venezuela is an independent and sovereign nation. "Independence is the greatest guarantee of our development. Currently, we must fight for economic and technologic independence to ensure the happiness of Venezuelan society".

President Maduro accused certain people in the world of wishing to destabilize Venezuela and prevent its social change. He stressed that, in the past, the Venezuelan economic model only benefitted 20% of the people and the foreign exchange revenue from oil was deposited in foreign accounts. Now, "Venezuela is using a reasonable revenue redistribution model to use taxation and wealth to improve the people's purchasing power".

During this meeting, Liang Wengen, head of the Chinese business delegation, stated that, "Chinese companies not only want to become business partners with Venezuela, but also want to be builders of this great nation". He pointed out that a country's development and progress, along with the constant improvement of the people's quality of life, will certainly produce shortages. Such shortages mean that the country has a great deal of room for development. Chinese companies experienced China's resource shortages in the past and developed greatly while overcoming these shortages, growing much stronger in the process. He said, "Chinese companies are willing to do their part to solve the supply shortages in Venezuela. They are willing to share their technology, experience, and investment with the Venezuelan people". Furthermore, he expressed the wish that Venezuela will build its own strong industrial system to solve these supply shortages as soon as possible.


The Chinese business delegation was formed by representatives from 11 companies, including Sany Group, China National Heavy Duty Truck, Qingdao Techking Tire Company, China Paper Corporation, Yuan Longping High-Tech Agriculture, and so on.

President Maduro gave his speech in front of a Sany mixer, which was full of praise for Sany's A8 cement pumps
During this week, the Chinese business delegation also held meetings with various Venezuelan government departments in Caracas. Both parties considered and studied cooperative projects in oil and natural gas, steel and aluminum ore, tires, machinery and equipment, heavy duty trucks, food, agricultural science and technology, paper, finance, and other fields. The two sides reached a new consensus on a number of projects and stated that they will continue further discussions regarding promoting the implementation of cooperative projects.

The Venezuelan Vice-President of the Council of Ministers and Minister of Finance Rodolfo Marco Torres, Vice-President of the Council of Ministers and Minister of Planning Ricardo José Menéndez Prieto, Minister of Agriculture José Luis Berroterán, Minister of Industry José David Cabello, and other officials met individually with the Chinese business delegation.

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