The coastal city of Yantai in East China's Shandong province and the Norwegian port city of Stavanger are on their way to establishing official friendship ties.

Zhang Dailing, vice mayor of Yantai extended a warm welcome to a Norwegian delegation headed by John Peter Hernes, vice mayor of Stavanger, on Oct 19.

The purpose of the delegation is to strengthen cooperation on marine fishery and heavy industrial equipment between the two cities and sign a letter of intent to become sister cities.

Zhang briefed the Norwegian delegation on his city's economic and social development. Designated as one of China's first open cities along the coast, Yantai has always attached great importance to the development of open economy, according to Zhang.

The vice mayor also introduced to his counterpart Yantai's strategy in replacing old growth drivers with new ones. Under the guidance of the strategy, Yantai has rolled out an ambitious development plan to build seven key industries into major drivers of economic growth.

The industries identified in the plan are information technology, food processing, non-ferrous metals and precious metals, high-end new chemical materials, equipment manufacturing, automobiles, and medical and health care.

Zhang stressed that Yantai and Stavanger, whose advantageous industries include steel, mechanical engineering, wood processing and petroleum science and technology, share a bright future of further cooperation. He expressed his wishes to strengthen cooperation with the Norwegian city and vowed to provide exchange platforms for enterprises from the two cities.

John agreed with Zhang, and pledged to promote the cooperation and exchanges on technology and trade between the two cities.