On 22nd June, 1979, China and Ireland established diplomatic ties. Though thousands of miles apart, the Chinese and Irish people enjoy enduring friendship as well as highly compatible development concepts that continue to flourish. 

During my five years as Chinese Ambassador to Ireland, I have visited all 26 counties of this beautiful island country and have been engaging with people from all walks of life to explore opportunities of cooperation between our two countries. It is the right time for me to share my thinking about China-Ireland relations.

In the past 45 years, China-Ireland relations have developed steadily and bilateral practical cooperation has yielded fruitful results as follows:

Our political trust has been deeply enhanced. China and Ireland have no historical disputes and fundamental conflicting interests. The two countries share a common perspective of independent foreign policy and an outlook of practical cooperation. In 2012,  Taoiseach Enda Kenny paid an official visit to China, during which the two sides elevated the bilateral relations to China-Ireland Strategic Partnership for Mutually Beneficial Cooperation, opening up a new chapter in our relations. 12 years on, the two sides have, with mutual understanding and mutual respect in mind, set an example of friendly coexistence between countries with different size, history, culture and system.

Our practical cooperation has been highly promoted  

Ireland played a special role in China's reform and opening-up. In 1980, just after China launched its reform and opening-up policy, a delegation led by Jiang Zemin, who would later become China’s president, visited Shannon Free Zone to learn how to establish modern special economic zones. Soon afterwards, China set up four special economic zones along its coast. Established as a way to experiment and promote economic reform and opening-up, the SEZs opened the country to new economic development possibilities.

Now China is the second largest economy in the world, one of the major trading partners of Ireland and its biggest trading partner in the Asia-Pacific. China is the largest purchaser of Irish pork and infant formula milk, and has become a major market with the greatest growth potential for Irish goods and services. Hitting 21.76 billion US dollars in 2023, trade in goods between China and Ireland jumped to a new high, which was over 4200 times the size of the bilateral trade volume 45 years ago. Since 2012, Ireland’s exports to China have surged five-fold. According to the statistics from Eurostat, Ireland is now one of the four EU states that maintain a trade surplus with China. At the end of the year 2022, Chinese investments in Ireland reached 9.37 billion euro, providing more than 5000 jobs for local people.

Our cultural and people-to-people exchanges have been widely expended

 China and Ireland are inheritors of different cultures, and both have made great contributions to the development of human civilizations. Irish literary giants Oscar Wilde, W. B. Yeats, George Bernard Shaw, James Joyce are well-known in China and their works are quite familiar to millions of Chinese readers. Irish pop music and theatrical shows, especially Riverdance and Westlife are beloved by massive Chinese audience.

Today, nearly 50,000 Chinese are studying, working and living in Ireland. The number of Irish people who go to China for work and study is also increasing. China and Ireland have established 7 twinning provinces/counties /cities, and 70 institutions or exchange programs in higher education. There are 3 Confucius Institutes and 13 Confucius classrooms in Ireland, and Chinese has become a subject of the Leaving Certificate exams ever since 2022. Dublin city has celebrated Chinese New Year for 17 consecutive years, with major landmarks and bridges lighted up with Chinese Red along and across the River Liffey. China extended visa-free entry to Irish citizens since March this year, and travelers are taking Hainan Airlines’s direct flights between Dublin and Beijing.

Our coordination and collaboration in multilateral platform has been closely tightened

 China and Ireland have worked together effectively within multilateral frameworks, and are both determined champions of the UN-centered international system and the international order underpinned by international law. Sharing common interests and similar positions in global issues, we are committed to making contributions to world peace and stability by improving global governance, advocating free trade, and countering unilateralism and protectionism.

Both China and Ireland are responsible countries in tackling climate change and other global challenges. China is striving to peak CO2 emissions before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, while Ireland is taking decisive action to achieve a 51% reduction in overall greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and to reach net-zero emissions by no later than 2050. China’s electric cars, lithium batteries and solar panels are helping the world to upgrade to an green, efficient and sustainable life, while the Irish Government also aims to play a leading role in responding to climate change, rather than a follower. I am so glad to notice that there are more and more BYD EVs running on the streets in Ireland, and a Chinese company, CGN Europe Energy, is operating one of the largest Wind Farm of Ireland.

Our 45 years of diplomatic ties not only provide us with a chance to review what we have achieved, more importantly, it is also an opportunity for us to look ahead into the future:

We need to create new highlights in our cooperation

China has a vast consumer market and a complete industrial system, while Ireland is a world leader in tertiary industry and financial services. Our economies are highly complementary. We shall continue to deepen traditional cooperation, and at the same time explore emerging opportunities in green and low-carbon development, sustainable agriculture, finance and bio-medicine, making the pie of cooperation even bigger.

We need to find new ways to boost our economic growth

 The world is in a new round of technological and industrial revolutions. Breakthroughs have been made in new technologies like block chain, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, bio-techs and quantum science. Working together, we will seize new opportunities, increase input in innovation, change the model of development and create new growth platforms.

We need to further promote people-to-people ties

 As countries with splendid cultures, China and Ireland have plenty of cultural and tourism resources. We shall encourage our cultural institutions and individuals to organize more art exhibitions and facilitate more mutual travel and visits. Through these exchanges, we could make new contributions to the diversity of human civilizations and mutual learning between different cultures.

We need to bring more stability and certainty to this volatile and changing era 

 The post-pandemic global economic growth is sluggish. At the beginning of this year, the World Bank warned that global growth in 2024 is set to slow for a third year in a row. In the meantime, geopolitical conflicts become more acute, protectionism and unilateralism are on the rise. China and Ireland shall bring to the world more certainty, stability and positive energy by jointly opposing decoupling and supply chains disruption. We shall promote coordination and sound interactions in major issues, help facilitate peaceful settlement of hotspot issues through dialogue, and work closely with each other within the UN framework to safeguard the peace and prosperity of global community.

China-Ireland relations are at the best time in history and face new opportunities of growth. I look forward to working with all of our Irish friends to elevate China-Ireland mutual-beneficial partnership to a further high level.