Experts call for digital unity of China, Europe

China and Europe should encourage industries and companies to work together to release the huge potential in the digital economy, experts told the Third World Internet Conference last week in Wuzhen, Zhejiang province.

Xu Yu, director-general of the Bureau of IT Development of the Cyberspace Administration of China, says that in the past few years China and Europe have cooperated successfully on digital issues. Europe has also become a hot investment destination for Chinese digital companies.

"With the steady development of the China-EU trade and investment relationship, the need to cooperate in the digital economy will be stronger," he says.

Attendees took notes at the Third World Internet Conference in Wuzhen on Nov 16. Photos by Zhu Xingxin / China Daily

Fang Aiqing, vice-minister of the Ministry of Commerce of China, says the European Union is the largest trade partner of China, and China is the second-largest trade partner of the EU. The digital economy now plays a big part in bilateral trade and investment.

He says that the EU's digital economy development is leading the world with its strong ICT and data processing technologies, while China's rapid development has resulted in the emergence of some of the world's leading companies.

"Both sides could work together and make the most of their advantages, which will definitely create huge potential for China's and EU's digital economy development," he says.

He says that the new generation of information technology, such as big data, cloud computing, Internet of Things and artificial intelligence, have hugely influenced the digital economy. China and Europe should increase their investment in digital infrastructure and help more emerging economies and smaller companies to participate in the global supply chain and reap the benefits.

"Both sides should together promote technological innovation and investment in the digital economy, encouraging big companies to share data and technology with small and micro companies, encourage their industrial clusters to get connected and participate in each other's R&D programs," he says.

Fang says that in 2015, the digital economy accounted for about 27.5 percent of China's GDP, and in the past five years the country's e-commerce transaction volume has seen an average annual growth of 35 percent. The digital economy has now penetrated into all aspects of production, circulation and consumption and is integrated with all industries.

He says that China is willing to work together with Europe on important issues of the digital economy, such as infrastructure building, e-commerce, cloud service, data protection and intellectual property rights, to reduce the gap between countries and regions and also to expand cooperation sectors.

Luigi Gambardella, president of ChinaEU, a business association based in Brussels, says that governments could do some market education and provide policies and services to boost the development of the digital economy and services. But they will also ultimately need entrepreneurs to make the decision to invest in the digital sector.

He suggests that China and Europe could establish a fund together to promote cooperation in the digital economy, which could also help those who have a passion in this area.

He says there are already many Chinese companies who are actively working on new technology, such as telecom equipment group ZTE Corp.

The EU should work closely with China's innovative companies to build trust and also to network, so as to make sure that their innovations benefit both China and the EU, he says.

chenyingqun@chinadaily.com.cn