The 6th Ministerial Conference of Forum Macao will be held on 21 and 22 April in Macao, local media has reported. The forum provides a platform for trade and intergovernmental cooperation between China and nine Portuguese-speaking countries.
Trade in goods between China and the lusophone nations totalled nearly US$221 billion last year, up almost 3 percent from 2022, according to figures from Forum Macao.
The year will be the first in-person Forum Macao conference since October 2016, as a 2019 iteration was postponed due to the leadership transfer between Macao’s then-former Chief Executive Chui Sai On and incumbent Ho Iat Seng.
[See more: Forum Macao marks its 20th anniversary with an exhibition and symposium]
Another meeting was put on hiatus because of the Covid-19 pandemic, but an extraordinary ministerial conference was held online in April 2022.
The conference gathers senior representatives from the Forum’s 10 member states, namely China, Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Portugal, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Timor-Leste, Cabo Verde, and São Tomé and Príncipe. Combined, the nine Portuguese-speaking members represent a population of 290 million.
Forum Macao was founded by China’s central government in 2003 and celebrated its 20th anniversary last year.
