China, ASEAN should improve on FTA development: VP

China and ASEAN should work more vigorously to improve on the Free Trade Area (FTA) development, Vice President Xi Jinping said in Nanning on Friday.

Xi made the remarks at the opening ceremony of the 9th China-ASEAN Business and Investment Summit and 2012 Forum on China-ASEAN Free Trade Area in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

It has just been less than three years since the launch of the China-ASEAN FTA. This arrangement, covering 1.9 billion people, has laid a solid foundation for ASEAN-centered regional integration and cooperation, Xi said.

"We hope that the two sides will continue to implement the various FTA agreements, further improve on trade and investment liberalization and facilitation, and optimize the mix of import and export commodities, so as to meet, as scheduled, the trade volume target of 500 billion U.S. dollars by 2015," Xi said.