S. Korea holds massive export fair for Chinese buyers

A massive export consultation session opened in Seoul on Thursday, bringing together some 1,100 South Korean and Chinese companies, the trade ministry said.

Major Chinese companies, including China's largest consumer electronics maker Haier and representative firms from China's major provinces and cities, attended the two-day festival at the Convention & Exhibition Center in southeastern Seoul.

The event was organized by the Korea Trade Promotion Agency and the Korea International Trade Association, as well as agencies that help small and medium-sized companies export their goods.

The agencies organized the festival in order to help local companies enter the Chinese market by utilizing the South Korea-China free trade agreement (FTA), which took effect on Dec. 20 last year.

China's top 230 buyers, including JD.com, China's second-largest electronics commerce distributor, and Suning, the No. 1 private distribution company, are present to negotiate with 900 Korean companies at four consultation halls, ministry officials said.

In the consumer goods consultation hall, a large number of Korean companies in the fields of food, cosmetics, daily necessities, and medicine and pharmacy products are participating. A total of 163 major distributors from China's 22 provinces and cities, as well as import vendors, were invited to the consumer goods hall.

A senior official of the Wushang Bulksale Chain Co. from Wuhan City said his company has been importing South Korean goods via import agents, but it plans to make direct imports from Korea to secure price competitiveness in the Chinese market. He said his company will expand Korean milk and seafood imports as the FTA enables Korean imports to be cleared of the Chinese customs within 48 years.

Agizagi, a Korean maker of goods for infants, concluded a memorandum of understanding for exports worth US$1 million with Aizhijia, a distributor from Wuhan.

Export negotiations were also going on at the investment invitation hall with Chinese investors in the fields of cosmetics, fashion, beauty items and bio products.

A briefing session on entering China's consumer goods market was held for Korean companies that want to make inroads into the Chinese market, and they were told of ways to enter China's online and offline distribution networks.

Some local companies with expertise in the electronics field were designated as "e-power 300" companies, attracting attention from Chinese buyers.

Woo Tae-hee, a deputy trade minister, said the government will boost support for Korean consumer goods companies that want to enter the Chinese market. (Yonhap)