The first China International Import Expo and the Hongqiao International Trade Forum opened on the morning of November 5. Government leaders from more than 130 countries and heads of international organizations, global business leaders, famous experts and scholars, and around 1,500 representatives from China's ministries, central agencies, and regional governments have attended the opening ceremony.

The first Hongqiao International Economic and Trade Forum, whose theme is "Spurring new vitality of global trade, creating an open and win-win scenario", consists of an opening ceremony and three parallel sessions in the afternoon which are themed on trade and opening-up, trade and innovation, and trade and investment respectively.

The parallel sessions will be composed of guest speeches and panel discussions, with over 2,000 participants, including Mukhisa Kituyi, Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Li Yong, Director-General, United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) , Angel Gurría, Secretary-General of the OECD, Bill Gates (Chairman of TerraPower), Jim Hackett (Ford President and CEO ) , Mark E Tucker( Group Chairman of HSBC Holdings plc), Jean-Paul Agon (chairman and CEO of L'Oréal), Jack Ma, Terry Gou (founder and chairman of Foxconn), and Justin Yifu Lin (former World Bank Chief Economist) .