The 9th Hongqiao International Economic Forum was held. Participants called for - adhere to multilateralism and promote inclusive economic globalization.

From November 5th to 6th, the 9th Hongqiao International Economic Forum with the theme of "Stabilizing Cooperation and Building an Open World Economy" was held in Shanghai. The forum organized 23 sub-forums and 7 closed-door meetings around the four sections of "open cooperation", "open innovation", "open development" and "open sharing". Participants held in-depth discussions on issues such as maintaining open cooperation and improving global economic governance, and contributed wisdom and strength to promoting the construction of an open world economy and promoting inclusive economic globalization.

Shared development: Let China’s big market opportunities benefit more countries

At the forum, the Chinese versions of the "World Openness Report 2026", "World Trade Report 2026" and "Export China Capability Development Report" were released to the public, opening a window for all parties to observe and understand China.

Liao Fan, director of the Institute of World Economics and Politics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that the current world opening up is showing a complex pattern of "overall significant tightening, intensified internal differentiation, and profound evolution of momentum." The world openness index in 2025 will be 0.7453, a year-on-year decrease of 1%, the largest decline since 2016. Among them, the openness index of developed economies decreased, while the openness index of emerging and developing economies increased. From 1990 to 2025, China's openness index increased by 28.18%, ranking among the top in the world, and the overall level of openness continues to be at a historically high level.

This year is the first year of China’s “15th Five-Year Plan”. Open practices such as high-quality joint construction of the "Belt and Road" and the continuous hosting of the International Import Expo vividly demonstrate China's positive contribution to global open cooperation based on mutual trust and accessibility.

The report points out that the Chinese market is the anchor of resilience for the world economy. China has the largest middle-income group in the world, and its consumption and import markets rank among the top two in the world. China encourages open-door innovation, and large-scale artificial intelligence models continue to benefit the world, helping all countries, especially developing countries, to benefit from technological innovation. The vast fertile ground for innovation attracts companies from all over the world to set up R&D centers and regional headquarters in China, and deeply integrate into China's innovation and industrial chains.

Hamid Rashid, former head of the United Nations Global Economic Monitoring Center and former editor-in-chief of the "World Economic Situation and Prospects" report, took artificial intelligence as an example and pointed out that the high cost of using large closed-source models restricts developing countries from participating in global competition. The open source model promoted by China can help narrow the artificial intelligence gap and help developing countries seize development opportunities.

As another important public product provided by China to promote global trade cooperation, the "Export China Capability Development Report" released for the first time by the forum explores the connection path between the advantages of various countries and China's market demand from the two dimensions of China's market demand and global supply capacity, and promotes the transformation of China's ultra-large market opportunities into common development results.

"I hope this report can help all parties deepen their understanding of the Chinese market, connect more smoothly with the Chinese market, and promote more diversified and more resilient export growth." Luce Maria de la Mora, Director of the International Trade and Commodities Division of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, who participated in the writing of the "Exporting China Capacity Development Report", said that over the past 25 years, China has become an increasingly important export market for economies of different sizes, creating important business opportunities for companies around the world.

"The release of this report comes at the right time." Edith Kaki Ngu, Minister of the Kenyan Embassy in China, said that our discussion on exports to China has shifted from focusing on potential to export performance, market access and other aspects. China has fully implemented zero-tariff measures with 53 African countries that have diplomatic relations with Kenya, including Kenya, bringing new opportunities for Kenya to expand exports to China.

Strengthening cooperation: injecting more certainty into the world economy

Currently, the risk of global trade fragmentation is rising, industrial competition is intensifying, and factors such as geopolitical conflicts and policy uncertainty continue to disrupt global industrial and supply chains. At multiple sub-forums, participants called for adhering to multilateralism, promoting cooperation through openness, and injecting more certainty into the world economy.

At the sub-forum "25th Anniversary of China's Accession to the WTO: Openness, Integration and Development", Maika Oshikawa, Director of the Accession Department of the World Trade Organization and Representative of the Director-General, said that although the world today faces uncertainties caused by geopolitical tensions, decoupling and unilateralism, global trade is still an important engine for world economic development and job creation. China is an active participant and staunch defender of the multilateral trading system. "The World Trade Organization looks forward to working with China and all WTO members to build a stronger, more effective and more inclusive multilateral trading system and continue to create opportunities for global growth, development and common prosperity." Oshikawa Maika said.

Luo Siyi, former director of the Economic and Commercial Policy Department of the City of London, believes that China's insistence on expanding opening up is in line with the main trends of world economic development. Policy adjustments in individual economies are not enough to reverse the global trend, and regional and cross-regional trade agreements provide complementary paths for cooperation.

Martin Jacques, a well-known British scholar, said that China's manufacturing competitiveness comes from industrial capabilities, infrastructure, complete supply chains and future-oriented industrial policies. China's international investment and green technology cooperation have created new conditions for the industrialization of other countries. All parties should avoid tariff barriers and decoupling and disconnection, and support the development of the Global South.

"It is crucial to maintain and improve the multilateral trading system with the WTO as the core and further enhance the representation and voice of developing countries in global governance." Chen Wenling, a senior researcher at the Institute of Contemporary China and the World, said at the "Global Economic Rebalancing: Unimpeded Trade, Industrial Collaboration and Inclusive Development" sub-forum that institutional openness and regional cooperation should also be continued to enhance the resilience of the industrial chain.

Wang Xiaoqiu, chairman of SAIC Motor Group Co., Ltd., said that equal competition and open cooperation have always been the main theme of the development of the automobile industry. The automobile industry is currently at a critical stage of accelerating changes in electrification and intelligence. It should adhere to open cooperation, eliminate trade barriers, promote the joint construction and mutual recognition of standards through dialogue and consultation, and deepen cooperation between Chinese and foreign enterprises in technology research and development, supply chain construction and other fields.

Green innovation: adding new momentum to global sustainable development

Jointly building an open world economy cannot be separated from the two-way empowerment of technological innovation and green transformation. How to activate growth momentum through technological innovation and promote sustainable development through green transformation has become a hot topic at this forum. Frontier fields such as humanoid robots and hydrogen energy have attracted attention from all parties.

At the "Humanoid Robots and Embodied Intelligence Industry Innovation and Development Cooperation" sub-forum, Tan Sen, President of the US-China Business Council, said: "China has become an important technological innovation center, and the speed and scale of innovation are impressive." Embodied intelligence is moving out of the laboratory and into real-life scenarios, and the importance of system reliability, manual supervision and safe operation has become increasingly prominent. The United States and China should maintain a normal dialogue around the security risks of artificial intelligence, carry out pragmatic cooperation in areas of common interests, promote the safe and responsible development of advanced technologies, and allow innovation to bring tangible benefits to enterprises and society.

At the sub-forum "High-Quality Development of Hydrogen Energy Promotes Global Energy Transformation", guests attending the meeting believed that the current green and low-carbon transformation of global energy continues to deepen, and the hydrogen energy industry is accelerating from pilot demonstration to large-scale and market-oriented, and is increasingly becoming an important engine to help achieve the goal of carbon peak and carbon neutrality.

Erwin Ramirez, Nicaragua’s Minister of Development, Industry and Trade, said that the climate crisis has profoundly affected the development prospects of various countries. Developed countries should take the lead in reducing emissions, provide financial and technical support to developing countries, ensure that developing countries enjoy the right to development while protecting the environment, and jointly protect our planet in an equitable manner.

"China has a solid policy foundation for the development of hydrogen energy, with diversified industrial application paths, and is building a complete hydrogen energy industry chain development framework." According to Li Keli, Vice Chairman of the Energy Working Group of the European Chamber of Commerce in China, Europe and China can deepen cooperation around integrated project collaboration, mutual recognition of standard certification, and joint market cultivation, so that hydrogen energy cooperation can serve the carbon reduction goals of both parties.

He Yangyi, deputy consul general of the Consulate General of the Netherlands in Shanghai, said that building a global integrated hydrogen energy market is inseparable from supporting infrastructure, trading mechanisms and multi-party international cooperation. He looks forward to relying on China's technological innovation and industrial scale to tap cooperation opportunities in the core equipment field, promote the coordinated efforts of the government and the market, and jointly promote the development of the hydrogen energy economy.

(This newspaper, Shanghai, November 6, reporters Li Qiang, Yue Linwei, Han Shuo, Li Xinyi, Tian Hong)