China is further opening its market for goods from Central and Eastern Europe as the first China-Central and Eastern European Countries (CEEC) Expo kicked off in Ningbo City of China’s northeastern Zhejiang Province on Saturday.

During the expo, a major deal was made between Slovakia and China. The two countries will establish an aviation simulation and training center with a total investment of nearly 29 million U.S. dollars. 

"China's aviation industry is developing fast, and there is a huge potential in the pilot training market. We hope to build this training center for Chinese pilots," said Pavol Grman, the supervisory board chair with Virtual Reality Media. 

A joint company will also be founded in the cooperation zone China established for CEEC companies. 

"The cooperation zone is one of the partners in our project. It managed some activities and so on and so on. I think the support from the Chinese side is higher and higher," said Robert Samuel, the director general of the United Industries in Slovakia. 

China’s growing consumer market has also attracted some of the best food manufacturers from Europe. 

Zemaitijos Pienas, a Lithuania-headquartered company that produces and sells dairy products in Lithuania and internationally, was one of the many companies attracted to the expo. 

"Our strategy is to work with supply chains, but to work in China, we are searching for other partners. And for a few years, we already get some relationships, and we are trying to establish it," said Erika Einore, the export manager with the company. 

To strengthen the economic ties, China has signed deals with 13 European countries for over 51 projects on exporting food products to China. 

"Countries in Central and Eastern Europe, especially eastern European countries such as Czech, Slovakia, Poland, and Hungary, have very good industrial bases, very developed culture, and a nice cultural and business environment," said Song Mingshun, the vice chairman of China Association for Standardization.

Meanwhile, China is not only sitting on its advantage of being a big market, but it is also trying to improve it. To build a fair and efficient environment, Chinese Customs is working with European countries in areas such as intellectual property protection and anti-fraud. 

In 2018, trade between China and Central and Eastern European countries reached over 80 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of over 20 percent from 2017. 

The expo will come to a close on Wednesday.

(Executive Editor: Xinyu Xie)