Visit promising for stronger China-UK ties

The British royal family, as a constitutional monarchy is not part of the political decision-making, but it does play a big role in building Britain's global image. The wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, which was broadcast live, was reportedly watched by more than 2 billion people around the world.

The year has been designated as year the Year of China-UK Cultural Exchanges, and both Beijing and London are showing their determination to improve ties.

Admittedly, the importance that the UK government attaches to relations with China is essentially out of economic concerns. But this is understandable given the damage that the global economic crisis in 2008 wrought on the British economy.

The two countries are important mutual trade partners, and Britain has become China's second-largest trade partner among the European Union members last year. More, their bilateral trade volume is expected to reach 100 billion US dollars in 2015, given the year-on-year growth of 16.6 percent in trade in goods from January to November 2014.

At the same time, the UK's competitive geographical location, economic policies, mature market and English language, have made it a major destination for Chinese investments in recent years, which include the high-end manufacturing industry, infrastructure, even hotel real estate. By the end of 2013, over 500 Chinese enterprises had a presence in the country, bringing a total of nearly 40 billion US dollars of investment stock, much more than the present British investments in China.

As the 2015 British General Election approaches, it would be wise that London resort to betterment of China-UK relationship for not only economic recovery, but also domestic voters' confidence.

The author is a researcher of European studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.