Last year, Croatia's export to China totalled USD 41 million while imports from the Asian country amounted to USD 1.4 billion.
The head of the Croatian Foreign Ministry's directorate for bilateral cooperation outside Europe, Tomislav Bosnjak, said that this showed that the current strategy for economic relations with China, based on an idea of Croatia being a gateway for China's products to European markets had not yielded some significant results.
Therefore he called for changing the strategy alongside continuing to promote Croatia's advantages: the fifth pan-European corridor passing through Croatia and the seaports of Rijeka and Ploce as gateways for China's goods designated to enter the European market.
An advisor in the Chinese Embassy in Croatia, Qian Chagyong, said that last year's visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao to Croatia opened a new chapter in the economic relations between the two countries.
He said that Croatia was the leading trading partner of China in the area of the former Yugoslavia.
The Chinese official said that his country would help Croatians to do business on its market. The first concrete step is to ensure free of charge ten stands for Croatians at a big economic fair in Shanghai in mid-2010 and to help organise Croatia's day at that event, according to him.