Chinese Ambassador to Jamaica Zhao Zhenyu has expressed satisfaction with his three-year stint in Jamaica, which will end in mid-November.

But what would make him even more happy is for Jamaica and China to sign off on a deal to get the trains rolling in Jamaica again.

Speaking at a joint function to mark the 57th National Day of the People’s Republic of China and farewell reception at the Hilton Kingston Hotel on Tuesday night, the ambassador said China’s relations with Jamaica had maintained a good momentum of all-round development, enhanced by political mutual trust, fruitful trade and economic co-operation and close co-operation on international affairs.

Where co-operative projects between the two countries were concerned, Ambassador Zhenyu said he would be giving a final push to the plans to rehabilitate the Jamaican railway system and the construction of the Jamaican telemedicine network.

In the meantime, he said the State Oceanic Administration of China had agreed to provide assistance to Jamaica’s marine science endeavours which will include accepting Jamaican scientists to do research work aboard the Chinese ocean research vessel Dayang Yihao shortly.

The ambassador also conveyed satisfaction with the newly established Jamaican embassy in Beijing and the embassy in Kingston, which he said had been complementing each other as a “working pair”.

Commenting on the economic and trade co-operation between the two countries, Ambassador Zhenyu noted that China had become Jamaica’s fourth largest trading partner, with Jamaica continuing to be the republic’s largest trading partner in the English-speaking Caribbean. He quoted statistics which showed that for 2005, trade volume between the two countries stood at US$325 million. Meanwhile, in the first seven months of this year the trade volume hit US$299.59 million, a 36.1 per cent increase over the same period last year.

Several dignitaries were in attendance including Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller and husband Errald Miller, former Governor-General Sir Howard Cooke and wife Lady Ivy Cooke, President of the Senate Syringa Marshall Burnett, Speaker of the House of Representatives Michael Peart, several senators and members of the House as well as members of the diplomatic and consular corps and leaders of the Chinese community.