Participants praise Xi's speech at CIIE opening
We were impressed by President Xi's speech, because Jamaica has just signed on to the Belt and Road Initiative and we think this is a really powerful and unifying initiative for many countries.
Jamaica can play a strong role in the maritime part of the initiative, because we have the seventh-largest natural harbor in the world — the Port of Kingston, which can take 14,000-TEU vessels. So the Belt and Road Initiative resonates for us very strongly.
He also talked about a rules-based multilateral trading system, which is very important for Jamaica. We are a member to the WTO agreement like China, and we believe in the multilateral rules-based system. For small developing countries, this is the best way to help us to get international trade and to protect our interest internationally.
Also, President Xi mentioned intellectual property protection and geographic indicators. This is very important for Jamaica because we have geographic indicators on our blue mountain coffee, Jamaica jerk and Jamaica rum. The brand of Jamaica is very strong and a lot of people use that brand without official permission, so therefore geographic indicators and IP protection are very important to us. These three things President Xi said were very important for us, and we very much support those positions.
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