Despite the global market uncertainties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the confidence and interest that foreign companies have in the Chinese market appear unchanged, with the value of tentative deals reached for one-year purchases of goods and services at the third China International Import Expo hitting $72.62 billion, a 2.1 percent year-on-year increase.

The six-day expo, which ended on Tuesday, took up nearly 360,000 square meters of exhibition space, an increase of 30,000 sq m from the previous edition. Nearly 400,000 professional visitors attended the event.

Initial statistics show that at least 411 new products, technologies and services made their China or global debuts at this year's CIIE, much higher than the figure last year, according to Sun Chenghai, deputy director-general of the CIIE Bureau.

The Medical Equipment and Healthcare Products exhibition area accounted for 120 technology and product debuts.

Nearly 80 percent of the Fortune 500 companies present at this year's exhibition are repeat attendees. Consumer goods took up 90,000 sq m of exhibition space this year, the largest of all the sections.

Meanwhile, the Food and Agricultural Products exhibition area hosted 1,264 companies from 93 countries, the most exhibitors among all sections.

Over at the auto section, the latest products of the world's top seven carmakers were on display.

By Shi Jing