Liam Fox, the British trade secretary, holds a press conference at the first China International Import Expo in Shanghai on Tuesday.

The UK Secretary of State for International Trade, Liam Fox, made it known he was impressed at the first China International Import Expo and called for a more open and free trade between China and the world.

“One of the reasons we committed so early on is that the concept is important, but the execution is also wonderful as China managed to handle such complex logistics so efficiently,” he said. “It offers us the opportunity to present the best of the UK in a range of sectors, including financial services, business services, healthcare, education and life sciences that I think China will increasingly want to have.”

Fox, who is on his fifth sojourn to China this year, said the intensity of his visits emphasizes the commitment of the UK government to having strong bilateral relations with China.

“Only 18 percent of the UK’s exports to China are services, which is a stark contrast to our global trading picture, which is about 50 percent services and 50 percent goods in general, so the opportunities for China to take UK’s expertise and also for UK companies to export services to the Chinese market is huge,” he said.

Fox announced that more venture capital from the tech industry came to London last year than France, Germany, Spain and Ireland combined.

“We would like to see that investment move in both directions so that we can share the benefits of technology, but we definitely need to have an equally open investment climate in both directions,” the 57-year-old said.

Fox added that the UK welcomes China’s ongoing efforts to open up and increase its imports of goods and services and improving its business environment.

“We welcome President Xi’s calls to relax investment restrictions in the education and healthcare sectors and we look forward to a clear timeline of liberalization,” he said.

The UK minister says the UK believes in free, open and fair trade, and believes that the rule-based global trade system should be based upon the World Trade Organization.

“We are more interdependent than we have ever been before, and therefore we have to understand that the global trade system and rules are not the property of any one country, region or political system. We’re all one system to work properly for the benefit of all,” Fox said.