Prince George is making inroads to aligning itself with another Chinese city.
A memorandum of understanding (MOU) was signed Friday at city hall with representatives from the visiting Suzhou City, from Anhui Province, China.
"According to the MOU, regular contact will be maintained between the civic leadership and relevant departments of the two sides in order to facilitate consultations and co-operation as well as matters of common concern," said a press release issued by the city.
Representatives from the eastern China city visited Prince George last December and expressed an interest in starting the sister city process, according to the press release.
"(Friday) was just an opportunity for them to get a better idea of what Prince George is all about," said Mayor Lyn Hall. "We were on their radar, so to speak, and they just wanted to see first hand."
Conversations focused on potential cultural, educational and professional exchanges, Hall said. There's also an interest in the city's fibre market because of Suzhou's furniture manufacturing industry.
According to a China foreign affairs website, Suzhou is a city of about 6.3 million and covers about 9,800 square kilometres.
While in the city, the five-person Suzhou delegation toured Carrier Lumber and UNBC.
"Prince George is strategically located on the shortest trade route between Asia-Pacific and U.S. heartland markets and provides an ideal location for transportation, logistics, manufacturing and export operations," Hall said, in a press release. "This MOU provides us with a solid base from which to increase understanding among our cities and to establish a mutually profitable long-term relationship."
Next steps will involve putting together information for Suzhou government representatives, who left Prince George Friday afternoon, about the university's bioenergy activities and the wood market, Hall said.
This would be the second link crafted between Prince George and a Chinese city.
In 2012, an MOU for a twinning arrangement was signed between Prince George and Jiangmen, China, during a week-long trip to the southern Guangdong province city by then-mayor Shari Green, then-councillors Lyn Hall and Dave Wilbur, city manager Kathleen Soltis and IPG CEO Heather Oland. It was a process kick started by a 2010 letter of intent signed in Prince George by then-mayor Dan Rogers.
Green, then-city manager Beth James and Oland made a return trip to Jiangmen - which is roughly 1,500 kilometres south of Suzhou City - in 2013 and returned with the expectation that the formal sister city agreement would be made by a visiting Chinese delegation in 2014.
That visit and agreement has yet to occur, but Hall said the relationship is still in the works.
"It's about diversification and if people are interested in doing business with us, we're certainly interested in talking to them and that's what this has really boiled down to," he said.
A reciprocal visit to Suzhou isn't in the works, Hall said. "There's no conversation about us going over to China. This was about us taking a look at... what they would like us to participate in with the MOU."
