I. China and the Netherlands established diplomatic relations at the Charge d'affaires level in November 1954, which was upgraded to the ambassadorial level in May 1972. In May 1981, the government of the Netherlands ratified the construction of two submarines for Taiwan by the Dutch companies, as a result of which the bilateral diplomatic ties were downgraded to the Charge d' affaires level. After the Netherlands undertook not to sell arms to Taiwan on February 1, 1984, China and the Netherlands restored ambassadorial diplomatic relations. At the moment, bilateral relations are enjoying sound development.
　　The important exchange of visits between the leaders of China and the Netherlands are as follows:
　　Vice Premier Zhu Rongji visited the Netherlands in April 1991;
　　Vice premier of the State Council and Foreign Minister Qian Qichen visited the Netherlands in May 1993;
　　Chairman Li Ruihuan of the Chinese People' s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) visited the Netherlands in September 1996;
　　Premier Li Peng of the State Council visited the Netherlands in February 1998;
　　Premier Zhu Rongji visited the Netherlands in July 2000;
　　Prime Minister Kok of the Netherlands visited China in June 1995;
　　Queen Beatrix Wilhelmina Armgard visited China in April 1999.

　　II. Economic and Trade Relations
　　The economic and trade relations between China and the Netherlands are developing very rapidly. According to the statistics of the Chinese Customs, the bilateral trade volume totaled US$ 5.995 billion in 2000,up 23.3% as against the previous year. The Netherlands is the third largest trade partner with China among the EU countries.
　　The economic and technological cooperation between China and the Netherlands is concentrated on, among others, agriculture, chemicals, electronics, communications, water conservancy and food processing. By the end of June 2000, the directly invested projects by the Netherlands in China had topped 764 with a contractual sum of US$ 4.481 billion and an actual input of US$ 2.416 billion. During Prime Minister Kok's visit to China in June 1995, he announced that the Netherlands would provide soft loans to China totaling US$ 790 million and business loans up to US$ 320 million at the lowest possible interest rates in seven years' time.
　　In October 2000, China and the Royal Dutch Shell Group of the Netherlands signed an agreement concerning the petroleum and chemical projects in the South China Sea with a total sum of more than US$ 4 billion.

　　III. Cultural, educational, scientific, technological and military exchanges
　　In 1999, about 20 Chinese cultural delegations visited the Netherlands as opposed to 3 on the part of the Netherlands to China.
　　From 1979 to 1999, China sent more than 2,400 government sponsored students to study in the Netherlands. 11 Dutch colleges and their 13 Chinese counterparts established inter-collegiate exchanges.
　　In October, 1999, General Chi Haotian, Chairman of the Central Military Committee and Minister of Defense paid a transit visit to the Netherlands and met with the Minister of Defense of the Netherlands De Grave.
　　Sister cities and provinces between the two countries are as follows:
　　Jiangsu Province-the North Brabant, Shangdong Province-North Holland, Guangdong Province-Utrecht, Shanghai- Rotterdam, Beijing- Amsterdam, Nanjing-Eindhoven, Changzhou-Tilburg, Qingdao-Velsen, Wuhan-Arnhem, Suzhou-Nijmegen.

　　IX. Bilateral agreements
　　China and the Netherlands have signed agreements in the following fields:
　　Cultural cooperation (1980)
　　Economic & technological cooperation (1980)
　　Mutual encouragement and protection of investment (1985)
　　Quarantine of plants (1986)
　　Cooperation in quarantine of animals and animal health (1995)
　　Civil aviation transport (1996)
　　Cooperation in science & technology (1999)