Chinese Vice President Han Zheng on Thursday held separate meetings in Beijing with a delegation of prominent business leaders led by Canada's Minister of Industry Melanie Joly, and with Lars Rebien Sørensen, chair of the Novo Nordisk Foundation and chair of the board of directors of Novo Nordisk.

While meeting with the Canadian delegation, Han stressed that China and Canada enjoy strong economic complementarities and vast potential for cooperation.

China stands ready to work with Canada to implement the important consensus reached by the two countries' leaders, consolidate cooperation in traditional areas, strengthen collaboration in emerging sectors such as new energy vehicles and artificial intelligence, and advance the development of China-Canada new strategic partnership on a sound, stable and sustainable track, Han said.

Joly said that Canada is willing to deepen mutually beneficial cooperation between the two countries' enterprises and promote the sound and stable development of bilateral relations.

During his meeting with Sørensen, Han noted that the Chinese government attaches great importance to public health and expressed the hope that Novo Nordisk will leverage its strengths to actively participate in the Healthy China Initiative.

China will continue to expand high-level opening up, strive to foster a first-class business environment that is market-oriented, law-based and internationalized, and support foreign-funded enterprises including Novo Nordisk in achieving better development in the country, Han said.

Emphasizing that Novo Nordisk is optimistic about China's economic prospects, Sørensen said that the company will continue to expand its business in China and participate in the development of the country's pharmaceutical industry.