The China-Australia Senior Business Leaders Forum of the Boao Forum for Asian (BFA) Annual Conference 2023 was held in Boao City, Hainan Province on the morning of March 31. Li Ruogu, president of the China International Economic Relations Association, and Andrew Forrest, founder and executive chairman of the Fortescue Metals Group (FMG), co-chaired the meeting under the theme of "China-Australia Innovation and Cooperation for Green Development". Chinese and Australian representatives exchanged ideas on promoting China-Australia economic and trade relations back to a healthy and stable development track. They discussed such topics as the future of China-Australia economic and trade relations, clean energy supply chain, third country market cooperation, ESG standards alignment, Australian exports to China, and Chinese enterprises' investment in Australia.

Hunan Iron & Steel Group Co., Ltd., Hunan Agricultural Development & Investment Group Co., Ltd., and Sany Group, recommended by the Department of Commerce of Hunan Province, were invited as Chinese guest representatives to attend the conference and make keynote speeches.

Li Jianyu, general manager of the Hunan Iron & Steel Group Co., Ltd., gave a keynote speech on China-Australia collaboration on clean energy and supply chain. He expected to strengthen partnership in such fields as clean energy technology, deep processing of steel and material supply, and industrial and supply chains.

Gong Xiaobo, chairman of the board of Hunan Agricultural Development & Investment Group Co., Ltd., called for extensive exchanges and cooperation in agriculture, food safety, trade, investment, and energy, responding to the uncertainty of the external environment with the certainty of self-development, and promoting the "quality upgrading" of economic and trade cooperation between the two countries. He expeced that, under the framework of the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement (FTA) and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), both sides jointly embark on a new journey of China-Australia agricultural cooperation and development. He hoped to facilitate Hunan high-quality agricultural products to "go global"; promote the brands of Hunan local special agricultural products; serve agricultural modernization, rural revitalization, and the people's well-being; and, continue to inject more certainty into the high-quality development of agriculture industry in Hunan, China and the world.

Zhou Fugui, director and executive president of the Sany Group and chairman of the Sany Renewable Energy Co., Ltd., shared his ideas on clean energy cooperation between China and Australia, to jointly expand common development opportunities for the Asia-Pacific region. Sany will join hands with FMG to explore cooperation potentials of wind power and photovoltaic hydrogen production and downstream applications of hydrogen energy in mining and other areas.

After the forum, the Chinese and Australian facilitators will send a joint letter to the leaders of China and Australia to report on the outcomes of the meeting and make recommendations.