On November 17, Liu Jiayi, Secretary of the CPC Shandong Provincial Committee, met with Stephen McNeil, Premier of Nova Scotia of Canadaat Shandong Hotel.

On behalf of CPC Shandong Provincial Committee and Shandong Provincial People’s Government, Liu Jiayi expressed warm welcome to the guests. He said that Premier has visited Shandong several times, and also sent a delegation to attend the Shandong International Friendship Cities Conference for Cooperation and Development last month, and it shows that the Premier highly values the cooperation with Shandong. At present, according to the instructions of President Xi Jinping, Shandong is implementing 8 development strategies, advancing all-roundopening-up, and enjoying great momentum of high-quality development, thus boasting great opportunities for making innovations, starting businesses and making investments in the province. The two provinces signed the agreement on establishing friendly cooperative relationship in 2016. In the future, we shoulddeepen and substantiate this relationship, and strive for more concrete results. Liu hoped that the two sides will strengthen local government cooperation, establish working mechanism, and synergize development strategies. He also hoped that the two sides will facilitate business exchanges, conduct cooperation in such areas as maritime and agricultural technologies, maritime and agricultural food processing and trade, expand results in education cooperation, boost cultural and people-to-people exchanges, and elevate the friendly cooperation to a new high.

Stephen McNeil thanked Shandong for the hospitality. He said that this is his 8th visit to China and 5th visit to Shandong. He believed that Shandong will have a promising future. Both sides are major provinces in ocean and agriculture sectors, thus enjoying solid cooperation foundation. He hoped that, by establishing cooperation platforms, the two sides could seize new investment opportunities, promote exchanges and cooperation in ocean, agriculture, art and other areas. He will work for closer cooperation with Shandong, provide more education opportunities for Shandong students, and explore new areas of cooperation.

Provincial leaders Sun Licheng and Yu Guo’an andofficials of Shandong Provincial Department of Education, Shandong Provincial Department of Agriculture, Shandong Provincial Department of Commerce andForeign Affairs Office of Shandong Provincial People’s Government also attended the meeting.