TNAG-2356-FCO40-3427-Ministerial-visits-from-the-UK-to-Hong-Kong-1991 — Page 61

From the Minister

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Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food

Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2HH

The Rt Hon Douglas Hurd CBE MP Foreign Secretary

Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Downing Street

London

SW1A 2AL

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and Hong Kong from 26 September to 3 October. The objectives of the China leg of the visit were to re-establish relations with the appropriate Ministers, following events in Tiananmen Square, and to assess the opportunities for trade between our two countries in the agriculture, fisheries and food sectors. I also took the opportunity to raise the question of human rights. In Hong Kong, I was primarily concerned with the business opportunities for our industry.

This was my

first visit to China. I arrived there only days after visiting Moscow in connection with the food distribution initiative and I found the contrast quite striking. While it would be invidious to draw conclusions about a country as large as China on the basis of one brief visit, China's efforts to cope with the massive task of feeding her 1.14 billion people (with an additional 17 million mouths to feed every year) were quite impressive, particularly when compared with the situation in the Soviet Union. China appears to have a very much better food production and distribution system than the Soviet Union and, in the areas I visited, food appeared to be plentiful and of reasonable quality.

Interestingly, while China's leaders remain as concerned as ever to safeguard their existing system of government, they recognise that it is necessary for them to embrace certain aspects of the free market system if their objective of increased agricultural production is to be achieved. This objective is central to their strategic planning since their leaders believe that, so long as they are able to feed and clothe the people, they will be less vulnerable to serious challenge. I certainly detected a feeling of isolation following the collapse of communism in the Union and Eastern Europe; but I was also left in no doubt

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