The panelists talked about Mexico-China: New Partnership & New Opportunity during the 6th Latin America China Investors Forum in Beijing from Sept 11-12. From left： Taimur Ahmad, Editor-in-Chief, LatinFinance;Tomas Cortés Zulbarán, Executive Director of Infrastructure Projects, Banco Interacciones; Jacques Antebi, Head of Equity Investment Division, Inter-American Investment Corporation; Yu Wen, Deputy GM – Corporate Business Department, The Export-Import Bank of China;Fernando Moreno, Managing Director – Financial Institutions, Banco Interacciones. Zhang Yuchen / China Daily

In Beijing from Sept 11-12, high-level officials and representatives of international companies, banks, government, and financial institutions shared their views on the possibility of further capital flow between China and Latin America in the annual two-day Latin America China Investors Forum in Beijing.

Yuan Xingyong, vice-president of the Export-Import Bank of China, said the total investment from China to Latin American countries as a whole amounted to $260 billion, an increase of one-and-a-half fold over the past five years.

Last year, the investment increase reached $15 billion, 42.9 percent of which is non-financial investment. In the infrastructure sector, the amount of contract volume is $94.5 billion.

Latin American countries not only provide natural resources but also offer a mature market that attracts constant investment, said Fransico de Roenzweig, undersecretary of foreign trade at the Secretariat of Economy of Mexico.

Mexico, whose infrastructure sector gathers investment from China, also looks for financial input from China to its agricultural and mining sectors.

Gustavo Leite, minister of industry and commerce of Paraguay, said "25 percent of our imports are from China, including all our motorcycles".

Among the largest importing partners of South American countries, China has been playing another important role in the region as a global investor.

David Gruppo, head of Latin America Corporate and Investment Banking, having lived in Latin America for a long time, said investment in the region was heating up beyond imagination, especially related to China.

About 1.1 billion consumers of the global market are in Latin American area, said Wang Jianjun, deputy director general of the foreign investment department at the National Development and Reform Committee, in his opening speech.

However, the obstacles to future cooperation exist in the imbalance between different countries on the continent and the lack of cooperation in multilateral trade.

China aims at an investment goal of $250 billion into the future of the financial engine of the region. "China once was the ‘late comer' to Latin America and now it's the second-largest investor into the market," said Yuan Xingyong. "We look forward to deepening that investment in the future."

zhangyuchen@chinadaily.com.cn