American business leaders have warmly welcomed the speech given by Chinese President Hu Jintao at Boeing Company on Wednesday.

 

"The Chinese president has never before given a policy statement this comprehensive and in such depth," said William B. Stafford, president of the Trade Development Alliance of Greater Seattle.

 

Hu identified five areas in which Chinese and Americans need to work together, drawing applause from an audience largely made up of local business leaders.

 

"I think from his speech and his remarks, we see a genuine and authentic feeling of wanting not only an open relationship with (our) country but also a genuine commitment to making sure these are stages of growth and development for our two nations," Howard Schultz, chairman and chief global strategist of Starbucks Coffee Company, told the media at a short press conference immediately after the lunch meeting.

 

Schultz said President Hu's real meaning was "there are differences, and there are great differences, but let us move forward together."

 

The Starbucks chairman also noted Hu was speaking to "every business person who is thinking about going to China and experiencing the great opportunities in China."

 

He said Starbucks was a good example.

 

Starbucks opened up its first store in Beijing in 1999, and it now has over 200 stores on the Chinese mainland, Schultz told the media.

 

"Success in the US is not an entitlement in China. You have to go there and earn it, and earn it the right way," Schultz said.

 

Noting that Hu was making the first major speech of his state visit to the US in Seattle, local business leaders and politicians said Hu had chosen the right place to make his point.

 

Paul Misener, vice president on global public policy with Amazon.com, said he was proud that Hu chose the home of Amazon.com as the first leg of his US visit.

 

"To hear his remarks about co-operation gives me considerable happiness about the future of the relationship between our countries, cultures and economies," Misener said.

 

"Seattle has become a very symbolic place to do it," Stafford said.

 

Washington State has scored a surplus in its trade with China, an example of how the deficit between China and the US can be addressed.

 

"We really need to look at trade in general between the US and all countries in the world, not just one particular country," said Gary Locke, former governor of Washington State.

 

Locke noted that President Hu made it clear that the Chinese want to buy more things from America.

 

Protection of intellectual property rights is another issue of major American concern.

 

"I know from my conversation with Bill Gates that he is enormously pleased with the frank discussions they had at Microsoft," Locke said. "And we heard from President Hu Jintao his commitment to protect intellectual property rights," Locke said.

 

(China Daily April 21, 2006)