FILE PHOTO

About half a dozen delegates from the Fife area business community are traveling to China through April 3 for a trade mission and familiarization tour. The delegation will visit Beijing, Xi’an and Shanghai.

Fife regional delegation departs for China

By Meghan Erkkinen

A group of Fife-area delegates and their family members departed March 25 for a trade mission and familiarization tour in China.

A total of 23 delegates from chambers of commerce around the state are participating in the tour. The Fife Regional Chamber of Commerce signed on to the tour for the first time this year, and about half a dozen representatives from the chamber are taking part. Those traveling through the Fife chamber include Richard Garchow of Great American RV; Katie Flannigan of Reservation Outpost; Phil Waldner of Fife Towing and Recovery; Beth Willis of the World Trade Center Tacoma; and Lori Leisner and Brenda Willis of Rushforth-Taylor Construction. Jim Reinbold, Fife’s assistant city manager, is also joining the group, but not as an official city delegate.

“The trip is kind of a two-part thing,” said Chamber Director PK MacLean, who is also joining the group. “It’s being billed as a trade mission and familiarization tour. While we do have several folks in the group that are taking the trade mission aspects of it, most everybody else is into the familiarization part of it.”

Lori Leisner and Brenda Willis are joining the trip to get a taste for the culture of China.

“It’s more the personal travel than business,” Willis said. “It’s just fascinating to see how the other people live.”

Leisner also said her trip was entirely personal.

“I’m anxious to see a lot of the things I’ve read about – the architecture, the waterways, the shopping,” she said.

Beth Willis, director of corporate development at the World Trade Center Tacoma, is one of the few people on the trip who has been to China before. Willis is specifically looking for cold storage opportunities on the trip. She said others might be looking for manufacturing or distribution opportunities.

Because most of those traveling have not been to China, the itinerary includes many cultural as well as business opportunities. The nine-day trip will include three days in Beijing, two in Xi’an and three in Shanghai.

“Our main time for meeting the factory owners and what not is in Beijing,” MacLean said.

The group returns April 3.

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