Kenneth Quinn, president of the World Food Prize Foundation and former U.S. ambassador to Cambodia, speaks during an interview with Xinhua in Des Moines, Iowa, the United States, Oct. 18, 2019. (Xinhua/Wang Ying)
DES MOINES, the United States, Nov. 6 (Xinhua) -- The United States should foster a positive relationship with China, as a sound development of bilateral ties is in the interest of both sides and vital to the rest of the world, a former U.S. diplomat has said.
"I believe my country's interests will be most well served by having as positive relationship as we can have with China," Kenneth Quinn, president of the World Food Prize Foundation and former U.S. ambassador to Cambodia, told Xinhua in a recent interview.
"The challenges of the coming 30 years are so enormous, and our relationship should be getting stronger and stronger, whether it's in business or cooperation on things like uplifting Africa," said Quinn, who has a 32-year career as an American diplomat.
The veteran diplomat told Xinhua that the United States and China, both having accomplished so much through their efforts and in which ordinary people have the opportunity to rise up and achieve through hard work, should be "natural friends."
Quinn, who made his first trip to China in 1979 and has traveled there frequently since then, said he is "impressed by how China has transformed itself," including its great headway in alleviating poverty over the past four decades.
Over the past 40 years, more than 700 million Chinese people have been lifted out of poverty, representing over 70 percent of global poverty reduction in the period.
"What an incredible achievement," said Quinn, adding the Chinese people should rightfully be proud of what their country has accomplished.
China builds its political structure on its history and the country is also unleashing the power of free market in developing its economy, said Quinn.
Pointing out "there's been enormous progress and enormous achievement in China," he added that "we have to respect how China got to where it is today."
The fact that China is now a united country with remarkable economic and scientific progress "ought to be the basis on which the United States deals with China," he noted.
Quinn, who has been heading the World Food Prize Foundation for about 20 years with a focus on refugee and humanitarian relief efforts, said that the United States and China should work together to find more common interest in coping with global challenges, such as the pressing task of feeding the huge population on the planet.
"We should have that strategic agreement on agricultural cooperation to work together to ensure that whether it's in Africa or South Asia or wherever that we use all of our power of research and all of our power of leadership together to make sure that our species meet that great challenge of feeding nine to ten billion people (on the globe by 2049)," he said.
