Secretary General’s Courtesy Visit to China

China has been actively engaged in the development of UCLG and UCLG ASPAC. The Secretary General of UCLG ASPAC, Bernadia I. Tjandradewi, responded positively to the invitation from Chinese members for courtesy visits and made her trip to China from 8-14 April 2014.

She met the Co-President of UCLG, Mayor Chen and expressed her thanks on behalf of the President and ExBu of UCLG ASPAC, for significant role of Guangzhou in promoting urban innovation in the world. The meeting resulted in plans for building a network of leaders and the capacity of local governments in transferring innovations as identified under the Guangzhou Urban Innovation Awards to the world. Guangzhou would again dispatch its official to the Secretariat in Jakarta later this year.

In Beijing, she met the Deputy Secretary General of the People Government of Beijing Municipality, Mr. Xu Xi, Deputy Secretary General of Beijing Government, as well as Mr. Song Jingwu, Director General of the Department of European-Asian Affairs, CPAFFC. She also made a brief stop in Haikou, Hainan – the host for the upcoming UCLG World Council to be held in the last week of November 2014, which will be followed by the Guangzhou Award Ceremony in Guangzhou. In her meeting with Mr. Li Jie, Deputy Mayor of Haikou’s Municipal People’s Government, UCLG ASPAC would provide its full support to the meetings.

She commented on her visits to China, ‘I was impressed with the efforts made by Chinese leaders and their people to drive economic growth with strong environmental concerns in place. There are plenty of public and open spaces all over the cities, where people use as part of their daily lives. I can see the harmony between past, current and future urban outlooks, which creates uniqueness of urban expansion in China.’