China and Central Asia develop economic relations with focus on green energy

Green energy has become a key area to enhance cooperation between China and Central Asian countries.

Universal Energy, a Shanghai-based renewable energy company, revealed on Wednesday that it signed contracts with Central Asian countries at the recently concluded China-Central Asia Summit.

Before the summit, an Uzbekistan-China business forum was held on May 17 when the company signed an agreement to invest in Uzbekistan's Samarqand Region, to build a 500MW wind power plant. Construction will kick off at the end of the year and after its completion in 2026, it will be the first wind power station in a mountain in Central Asia.

The day after the summit began, Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov met with the Chinese business community and witnessed the signing of a memorandum of understanding on cooperation between Universal Energy and the Ministry of Energy and Industry of the Kyrgyz Republic.

Japarov told Nan Yi, chairman and CEO of Universal Energy, that Kyrgyzstan welcomes investment from the company and will support its development in Kyrgyzstan to speed up optimizing its energy structure.

He also had friendly meetings with ministers of energy of various countries.

"The summit has greatly promoted the economic and trade cooperation between China and Central Asian countries," he said. "Take Universal Energy for example, we've enjoyed the benefits brought by the summit, which has not only deepened our business expansion in Central Asia, but also promoted mutual benefit between China and Central Asia."

Since its first investment of a wind and photovoltaic power station in Kazakhstan the total capacity of its new-energy projects in Central Asia has reached 1.13GW, making it the largest clean energy supplier in the region, according to Nan.