中国推动建立亚太自由贸易区

Chinese officials are planning to press for the establishment of an Asia-Pacific Free Trade Area at the upcoming APEC meetings in Beijing.

There are currently 56 different FTAs in the Asia-Pacific region.

Zhang Shaogang with the Chinese Ministry of Commerce says they'd like to see those deals integrated.

"In terms of promoting regional economic integration, we advocate the start of the construction of the Asia-Pacific FTA and treat this as our priority task. This has gained a wide range of responses among APEC members."

Meantime, the first series of APEC meetings are set to begin tomorrow.

Authorities in Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei have taken steps to try to ensure the air quality is reasonable.

Major polluting operations have been forced to cut production.

A number of construction sites have also been shut down.

Authorities hope this will knock down pollution levels by around 30-percent.

A significant number of new police checkpoints have also been set up around Beijing.