The Second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation (BRF) will take place in Beijing from April 25 to April 27 this year with the theme of "Belt and Road Cooperation, Shaping a Brighter Shared Future", aiming to bring about high-quality cooperation under the Belt and Road framework.

The first BRF was held in Beijing in May 2017, and a list of major deliverables was issued during the highest-level forum on the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) – 76 items that comprise more than 270 concrete results in five key areas, namely policy, infrastructure, trade, financial and people-to-people connectivity.

It is time to check the completion of tasks ahead of the second BRF.

Guided by the principle of consultation and cooperation for shared benefits and by enhancing connectivity in the five priority areas of policy, the BRI has given a strong boost to international cooperation on connectivity, said Yang Jiechi, member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and director of the Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs.

During the first forum, Chinese President Xi Jinping said that China had already signed Belt and Road cooperation agreements with 68 countries and international organizations, and the data has been updated to a new lever: A total of 126 countries and 29 international organizations have signed BRI cooperation documents with China so far.

2019 is the start of the second five years of Belt and Road construction and the need to move BRI cooperation toward quality development was stressed by President Xi at a seminar marking the BRI's fifth anniversary last August.

More agreements are expected to be signed, and more detailed guidance and documentation are expected to be introduced towards quality BRI cooperation in the coming days, so wait and see the new challenges on the task list of the second BRF.