On 21 November the Belgian ambassador Bernard Pierre invited Ms. Huang Yan who recently was promoted as Director of the Beijing Municipal Planning Commission – The Executive Office of Beijing Metropolitan Planning & Construction Committee.
A mouthful but in short she is one of the key people for the urbanization aspects of the city.
She is a very sharp person and is fluent in English – of course, she also studied for two years in Leuven University (Belgium).

I had the pleasure to work with her during the tendering process for the Olympic venues in Beijing, the Bird’s Nest in particular.
She was very supportive of the “Athletes Alley” project of our Belgian artist Olivier Strebelle.
Also joined the lunch were Bart Pennewaert and Tim Van Anderlecht, First and Third Secretaries of the embassy and Gérard Seghers, Economic and Commercial Counsellor (Wallonia).

Koen Allaert, Managing Director Flanders Investment and Trade (FIT) came to Beijing with a delegation related to renewable energy. It was also, at least for me, the farewell for our good friend Siegfried who is leaving for Hong Kong after so many years representing FIT over here.

Siegfried was good fun to work with and established a solid base for FIT. He is also a sports maniac (sorry Siegfried) doing real crazy stuff like triathlons. Good luck in the SAR…

I did not make up this one. Had to read it twice to realize it was “genuine”.
Source: Flanders Investment and Trade / Club Diaspora
Brussels – October 17, 2007 – According to the UNCTAD World Investment Report, foreign direct investment in Belgium doubled in 2006 to USD 72 billion. The notional interest deduction scheme is one of the main reasons why Belgium outperformed China, which came in at USD 69.5 billion.
The report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) shows that only the United States, the United Kingdom and France attracted more foreign direct investment in 2006. For a small country like Belgium, fourth place is an impressive achievement. Belgium also doubled its outward investment to USD 63 billion.
The strong growth in foreign direct investment is, according to the UNCTAD report, the result of the beneficial fiscal measure for coordination centers and of the notional interest deduction scheme here. The latter was installed in 2006 and allows foreign companies and organizations to reduce their taxable base when making investments from their own resources.
Belgium has, after Hong Kong, the highest ‘transnationality index’. This index measures which countries derive the most benefit from inward investment. The index is based on the business assets that foreign companies own in Belgium, the inward flow of new investment and the relative share of branches of foreign companies in Belgian GDP and in the total employment.
The report also states that Belgium is an economically-attractive location for branches of international financial groups. In that regard, there are three Belgian banks in the top 50 of the most internationalized financial institutions: KBC, Dexia and Fortis. (reported by De Tijd newspaper)