Minister Han Changfu met Dr. Thani Ahmed Al Zeyoudi, Minister of Climate Change and Environment of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), in Dubai on Sept. 28, 2016. The two sides exchanged views on strengthening China-UAE agricultural cooperation.
Minister Han briefly reviewed the bilateral agricultural cooperation, and noted that China and UAE, despite of different conditions in agriculture, enjoy great potential for cooperation due to the complementarities, expressing that his trip to the UAE is to establish a sound bilateral agricultural cooperation mechanism and promote the bilateral agricultural cooperation in an all-round manner. Minister Han suggested that the two sides strengthen cooperation in the integrated pest management for date palm, dryland farming, water resources utilization, saline and alkaline land reclamation, fisheries, halal food and capacity building.
Dr. Zeyoudi fully agreed with Minister Han and looked forward to promoting all-round cooperation with China. In addition, the two ministers reached broad consensus on the establishment of the bilateral agricultural cooperation mechanism, exchanges of date palm research, dryland farming development, saline and alkaline land reclamation and marine aquaculture.
The two sides agreed to sign an MOU on strengthening China-UAE agricultural cooperation at an appropriate time, and designated respective Directors-General in charge of international cooperation to step up specific actions at working level.
Minister Han also invited the UAE to the agricultural trade fair to be held in Kunming in November this year, and Dr. Zeyoudi pledged to send sizable delegation to it.
During his stay in the UAE, Minister Han also visited date palm research sites and agricultural products markets.