Chairman to boost Chinese links

The Bunbury-Jiaxing Business Office has elected a new chairman who is keen to boost awareness about the business relationship between China and the South West.

Bunbury City Council chief executive officer Andrew Brien has stepped into the role this week and is looking forward to working closely with the Australia China Business Council.

Mr Brien said the South West’s relationship with China has been established for 15 years with trade partnerships strengthening in this time.

“We are trying to get greater awareness of what we do in the South West and we will be looking at bringing economic data from China that is relevant to the region to market more business opportunities,” he said.

“In the next two months we will launch a website which will have resources available in both Chinese and English.

“Being in the same time zone provides a good opportunity for business trade across a lot of industries.”

An office report revealed in the past year 83 businesses and clients approached it for advice from a range of sectors including agriculture, government bodies, education and tourism.

Bunbury Chamber of Commerce and Industries chief executive officer Ray Philp said group members will focus on investing in more Mandarin classes for the business community.

He said there had been great feedback from the business community on the importance of having business cards available in Chinese and English, especially as trade increased between the two countries.

Chinese consul-general Lei Kezhong visited Bunbury last month and said in recent years the agricultural relationship between China and Australia had grown rapidly.

“Bunbury has been one of the fastest developing communities in Australia and is the highlight of development in agriculture, tourism and commerce and we also know this region is Australia’s major livestock growth area,” he said.