Italian trade official upbeat about Chinese investment

MILAN - Chinese investment is growing in Italy and a combination of Chinese money and Italian know-how has good prospects, an Italian trade official has said.

"We already saw important Chinese investments and I am convinced that in the next two years we will have a very important increase," Riccardo Monti, president of the ICE-Italian Trade Promotion Agency, told Xinhua at the ongoing Expo Milan 2015.

China has four trillion U.S. dollars of foreign exchange reserves and has to invest while Italy has know-how for a lot of excellent products but lacks the financial resources to develop them, he noted.

Chinese investors are particularly active in the real estate sector, but they also have interest in fashion, luxury goods and yachting, Monti explained.

He expressed the hope to see more Chinese investment in Italian infrastructure. "We need international capital. There are already some advanced negotiations on specific projects and I hope to see them finalized soon."

China and Italy are collaborating in a very intense way on agro-technology, said Monti, adding China is going to be a top-priority market for Italian farm products.

Italy wants to work in a more structured way to better tackle the Chinese market and the Italian business community has to know the Chinese distribution net better, said Monti.

He was impressed by China's presence at the Milan Expo. "China for us is a fundamental partner. It is the only country with three pavilions here at the expo and it is the biggest international investor."

Around one million Chinese have bought tickets for the expo, he said.