Match-making of Trade & Investment
More professional visitors were invited to the CAEXPO and more efforts were put in matchmaking of trade and projects. The official website of China-ASEAN Expo (www.caexpo.org) put forward two channels of commodity trade and investment cooperation. During the 2nd CAEXPO, the E-information Center served about one thousand attendees and more than 100 traders found cooperation partners through the matchmaking system. The CAEXPO Secretariat set up an online database of enterprises, products and projects, collecting 6,655 projects which include 5,592 domestic investment projects, 336 outbound investment projects (Going Global Projets) and 727 foreign investment projects.

Singapore: The Gem Within The Jewel Box
This year, the Singapore Pavilion was built around the concept of a jewel box. Themed “Unique People, Unique Places”, the glittering design of the Singapore Pavilion served to provide visitors a sensory experience of Uniquely Singapore through the interactive displays and exhibits as well as dance performances by Singapore’s own home-grown artistes. Upon entering the Pavilion, visitors were drawn into a scintillating enclosure lit by fibreoptics and multimedia displays, where technology, information, light, sound and textures combined to deliver the many facets of Singapore that reflected its dynamic, cosmopolitan and multi-cultural people.
The highlight of the Singapore Pavilion, which spaned some 300 square metres, lay in the Jewel Box multimedia show that the visitors encountered at the end of their tour. This 6-minute 270o immersive multimedia video was a metaphorical reference to Singapore. It depicted seven gems representing the seven themes of education, lifestyle, medicine, transportation, communication, commerce, arts and culture and uses a young lady's life experiences to give a personal touch to the themes and connected with the audience.
The Singapore Pavilion also showcased the products and services of the Singapore Business Federation and nine Singapore-based companies from various industries ranging from electronics to lifestyle. These companies included Borden Co, DPC Design, Kingsmen Exhibits, PICO Centre International, Singapore Information Services, Hypertronics, Hong Leong Asia, and Design Act.
The Singapore Pavilion was jointly organised by seven government agencies, namely, the Singapore Tourism Board (STB), International Enterprise Singapore (IE Singapore), Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB), Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), JTC Corporation (JTC), Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS), and the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA).

Luang Prabang the City of Charm of Lao PDR in 2nd China-ASEAN Expo 2005
The city of Charm of Lao PDR was promoted during the 2nd CAEXPO, which aimed to attract Chinese tourist to visit Luang Prabang in next coming years.

Luang Prabang is renowned as the cultural and religious capital of Laos . On the 2nd December 1995, UNESCO inscribed the town on it’s World Heritage List, ensuring the preservation of a mixture of traditional Lao and French colonial architecture. The unique character and charm of Luang Prabang helps to make it the one of the most popular tourist destination in the country. The magnificent temple in Luang Prabang are considered among the most beautiful in South East Asia.

Philippines: You partner in asia
To promote economic cooperation and investments among the China-ASEAN countries, the Expo Secretariat arranged an Investment Promotion Meeting for the Philippines and Cebu Province. Carrying the theme “ Philippines: Your Partner in Asia”.
Cebu focused on its achievements in trade, tourism, investment, science and technology and cultural development. The following trade opportunities in Cebu were highlighted: fresh and processed food; furniture; gift toys and house wares; fashion accessories; IT and IT-enabled services; high precision metal working products; services such as real estate, finance and trading & other products and services. The tourism display capitalized on the familiarity of the Chinese people with selected tourist spots in Cebu, with special focus on health, wellness and medical tourism.
The Philippine Board of Investments (PBOI) together with the Philippine Foreign Trade Service Corps (PFTSC) handled the arrangements / programme for the Briefing on Investment Policies and Environment of the Philippines.

Tibetan enterprises attracted 35 mln in the 2nd CAEXPO
Tibetan enterprises attracted over 35 million yuan by signing 3 cooperation contracts in the 2nd China-ASEAN Exposition which was over in Nanning of Guangxi.
Besides that, 500,000 dollar's export agreements were signed in the exposition.
Sponsored by State Business Ministry and trade department of ASEAN, undertaken by government of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, the 2nd China-ASEAN Exposition set up 16 exhibition halls focusing on trade business, investment cooperation and tourism, over 8,000 businessmen all over the world attended this exposition.

Vietnamese enterprises made nearly 1,000 deals at CAEXPO 2005
The 2nd CAEXPO was organized in Nanning, Guangxi province from October 19 – 22. Vietnam joined the event with 109 stalls of 66 companies, ranking second in participation numbers after Thailand.
Vietnamese companies mainly presented agricultural, forestry, and seafood products, as well as general information about trade, tourism, service, and investment opportunities. Vietnamese goods were sold out at the fair, making over US$5mil.
According to organizers, nearly 3mil people visited the fair, of whom, around 1mil visited Vietnam’s stalls.
During the fair, Vietnam organised the “Vietnam-China business and investment forum”, attracting over 400 entrepreneurs, as well as conducting the ground breaking ceremony for the 4ha Vietnam export showroom at the China-ASEAN International Trade Zone.
Vietnam was presented with two prizes: “best organizational task” and “best investment calling projects”.

China-ASEAN cooperation benefits, Myanmar PM
The Myanmar government highly appreciated the active role played by the China-ASEAN Expo in promoting regional economic cooperation and bilateral exchanges, and the China-ASEAN cooperation will benefit 1.88 billion people directly, Myanmar's Prime Minister Soe Win told reporters when attending the 2nd China-ASEAN Expo.
This is the second year that Prime Minister Soe Win leads a delegation to participate in this grand annual event, who also attended the opening ceremony of the 2nd China-ASEAN Business & Investment Summit a day earlier.
Mr. Soe Win spoke highly of Guangxi's efforts in city construction and organization of the CAEXPO. He said that Myanmar began pushing forward state opening up and reform in 1988, and construction on all sides is going on. He hoped enterprises from various countries could go to explore his nation for business opportunities, bring advanced technologies to the country and seek mutual benefits from Myanmar’s construction and development.
Being close neighbors, Myanmar and China still see their bilateral trade focusing on the border, Mr. Soe Win noted. Last year the bilateral trade volume stood at 780 million US dollars, which is expected to reach 1.05 billion dollars this year. There exists large potential for border trade considering its relatively small scale at present.
The Myanmar government encourages the development of private business at home, said the Prime Minister. A country of rich natural resources, Myanmar hopes to lure competitive enterprises from all countries to participate in multilateral economic cooperation.
Prime Minister Soe Win extended warm welcome to Chinese entrepreneurs to seek business opportunities in Myanmar, who, like business people from other countries, will benefit substantially from preferential policies offered by Myanmar.

Tourism & Culture
Tourism cooperation was one important focus of the 2nd CAEXPO. Tourism exchange was highlighted, including introductions to tourist spots over china and the ASEAN countries, exhibitions of tourist goods, and invitation to tourist development projects.
One innovation of this year's CAEXPO was the “City of Charm” setup which was a significant cultural cooperation, emphasizing “tourist hotspots” of China's Beijing, Thailand's Chiang Mai, Vietnam's Hanoi, Land Prabang of Laos, Indonesia's Jakarta, Cebu of Philippines, Mandalay of Myanmar, Malaysia's Putrajaya, Singapore City and Siem Reap of Cambodia.
In front of the display area for Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, the wooden houses with Thai flavors became the focus of hundreds of travelers' cameras, while in the area for Beijing, many tourists from ASEAN nations were deeply fascinated by the traditional “flour figure art” of the traditional folk artists. One of the most shining features of this expo, “City of Charm” showcased the most typical tourism cities of China and ASEAN.
The staff of the exhibition hall said thousands of visitors, both from home and overseas, had come to enjoy the hallmarks of the 11 cities selected. A tourist from Beijing said he has great affection for the Southeast Asian nations. He had, during the past few years, visited Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia, and he was thinking of traveling to Indonesia and the Philippines at the end of this year.
Indonesian tourist Maureen Tempobolon said she had heard of the renowned Chinese tea for a long time, and this time she bought a dozen kinds of fragrant Chinese tea at the expo. She said she would bring them back to share with her kinsfolk and friends to enjoy and compare them with the tea grown in Indonesia. Rong Xiaoning, director of the cultural department of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, said China, especially its Guangxi region, has deep historical connections with the ASEAN member countries. A host of ethnicities in Thailand, Vietnam, Laos and Myanmar originated in southern China, and Rong noted that similarities in history, languages and culture are likely to bring about ASEAN nations' recognition of, and resonance with, the Chinese culture.
Ouk Keo Rattanak, vice governor of Cambodia's Siem Reap Province, said the ASEAN nations are also striving to develop their cultural industries with the help of tourism. The province signed a tourism cooperation agreement with southwest China's Yunnan province last year, and a group of Chinese specialists went there to help develop tourism resources. The official said he hoped to set up this type of relationship with more provinces and regions of China at the expo, so as to boost the growth of tourism and cultural exchanges between Cambodia and China.

$777 mln worth agricultural pacts signed in China-ASEAN expo
The new concepts in China's agricultural production brought the country more business opportunities during the 2nd China-ASEAN Expo.
On Wednesday more than 20 agricultural development areas in China signed contracts on 26 cooperative projects with businesses from the United States, Vietnam, Thailand and China. The contracts involved a total value of 6.3 billion yuan (777 million US dollars).
The contracts were attributed to the new agricultural production concepts that China publicized at the expo, namely agricultural technological innovation, the spread of high-quality species, and the reform of traditional farming methods, said Jiang Jixiong, board chairman of Guangxi Agricultural Resource Development Group.
The organizing committee of the expo set aside a 500-square-meter area to showcase more than 600 products from China's 20-odd agricultural development areas.
At the first China-ASEAN Expo, China's agricultural development companies signed 23 cooperation contracts worth 16.5 billion yuan (2 billion US dollars). Most of the projects are carried out well.

ASEAN media team learns more about China's development
Seventeen media practitioners from ASEAN countries were given an opportunity to explore and get first hand information about the development of People's Republic of China. All the ASEAN countries except Thailand sent their media representatives for the China-ASEAN Journalists Visit Programme.
The ASEAN journalists who represented various agencies met with the Vice Minister of Ministry of Information Industry, who explained on the China-ASEAN cooperation in telecommunication. The ministry stated that the ASEAN region has a fast growth in ICT industry.
Other officials met by the ASEAN media representatives were Mr Wu Dawei, China's Vice Foreign Minister, officials of the Ministry of Commerce, Head of Guangxi Province and Head of Guangdong Province.
In promoting trade relations between ASEAN and China, which is the sixth largest trading partner, the annual China-ASEAN expo was held in Nanning at Guangxi province starting last year. The 2nd China-ASEAN Expo was held from October 19 to 22, 2005 along with the 2nd China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit.
The press delegation from ASEAN countries also visited the China-ASEAN Economic Zone in Nanning, which will be planned and developed into an industrial city, a satellite town and an environment-friendly garden city.