Kunming South Asia Expo: The "shopping carts" of international purchasers keep growing.

KUNMING, June 15 (China News Service) — At the 10th China–South Asia Expo (South Asia Expo) currently underway in Kunming, buyers from various countries have been bustling through the pavilions over the past few days, searching for products and business opportunities.

From traditional agricultural and specialty products such as coffee, flowers, and nuts, to "new arrivals" including processing production lines and new energy and new material products, their "shopping carts" are getting fuller and fuller.

June 13: The South Asia Expo Procurement Matching Center at the 10th China–South Asia Expo. (Photo by China News Service reporter Liu Ranyang)

Agricultural products are one of the most sought‑after categories for international buyers. At a dedicated matchmaking event for specialty agricultural product exports, around 80 procurement representatives from 15 countries and regions, including Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Croatia, Thailand, and Bangladesh, held targeted discussions with 102 suppliers from 10 Chinese provinces and autonomous regions. The talks focused on cooperation in fruits, flowers, tea, coffee, traditional Chinese medicinal materials, edible fungi, and other industries.

At the same time, international buyers are extending their focus from agricultural products to production equipment and other fields. Lafooco, a Vietnamese nut trading and processing company attending the South Asia Expo for the first time, not only showed interest in raw materials such as Yunnan walnuts but also signed a contract with a smart equipment company in Baoshan to purchase a walnut processing production line.

"In the past, we mainly sourced raw materials from the United States, Turkey, and other countries, but international logistics costs have fluctuated significantly in recent years," said Zhu Yue, head of the company's China operations. He noted that Yunnan is rich in nut resources with stable output, and also benefits from its geographical proximity to Vietnam as well as rapidly upgrading automated processing equipment. The company is very willing to take the South Asia Expo as an opportunity to establish long‑term, in‑depth cooperation in Yunnan.

As seen from the frequent cooperation agreements reached at the South Asia Expo, the "shopping carts" of international buyers are indeed expanding. During the exhibition, multiple business associations and enterprises from Yunnan and Malaysia signed 16 cooperation agreements covering areas such as food procurement, logistics, and exhibition and investment promotion, with a total contract value of RMB 135 million. In addition, a subsidiary of Yunnan Energy Investment Group signed a procurement agreement worth RMB 100 million for "new energy materials" with a Vietnamese chemical company.

Shi Yonghong, Vice President of the China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Machinery and Electronic Products, stated at the South Asia Expo that demand in South Asia for infrastructure, healthcare, green energy, digital economy, and other sectors is growing continuously, creating broad room for the international public procurement market. "We will leverage the South Asia Expo platform to promote more 'Made in China' and 'Made in Yunnan' products into the public procurement supply chains of the United Nations and South Asian countries." (End)