OREANDA-NEWS. March 20, 2012. Regional cooperation between China and Japan plays an important part in better bilateral relations, diplomats and officials from both countries said on Monday. 

Li Xiaolin, head of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, said there are many areas that have great potential for the two countries' regional cooperation, including economic development, urban construction, city management, land utilization, green energies and disaster relief. 

According to Li, China and Japan will hold a dialogue between their provincial and prefecture governors on April 18 in Tokyo. This is the first time they will have a formal mechanism of this kind. 

Five officials at the provincial level from Ningxia Hui autonomous region, Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, Anhui province, Jilin province and Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region will attend the forum, Li said. 

"It will be great if we could establish a relatively stable platform for cooperation between Chinese and Japanese provincial and prefecture governors," Li said. 

Communication and cooperation between local governments in China and Japan have a long history, especially exchanges at city level. 

Two port cities, Japan's Kobe and China's Tianjin, became the first pair of sister cities in 1973. Since then, more than 300 pairs of sister cities have been established between the two countries. 

Former United Nations undersecretary-general Yasushi Akashi said many Japanese prefecture governors are very enthusiastic to advance their regions' cooperation with China. 

They are eager to discuss specific issues of regional development with their Chinese counterparts, he said. 

Yasushi Kudo, representative of Japan's Genron NPO, said currently Japan is considering how to advance regional economic cooperation with China in Japan's post-disaster reconstruction. 

Robust local economies in China, especially those located close to Japan, have become important sources of materials needed in Japan's disaster relief and post-disaster reconstruction. 

According to the Globe magazine affiliated to Xinhua News Agency, food exports from Ningbo - a coastal city in East China's Zhejiang province - to Japan increased by 38.5 percent at the end of March 2011, compared with the same period in the previous year. 

However, some Japanese officials' irresponsible comments on thorny issues in bilateral relations have affected cooperation between the two countries on the regional front. 

Chen Haosu, former president of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, said: "The two countries should bear in mind one principle, which is never to say things or do things that might hurt cooperation." 

"Cooperation benefits both. While fighting, both lose," said Wei Jianguo, former deputy minister of commerce.