For the past four decades, China has been a supporter of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), which promotes industrialization in developing and transitioning countries. A beneficiary of UNIDO programs itself, China is now playing a lead role in fulfilling the agency's mandate of promoting inclusive and sustainable industrial development worldwide.

Director General of UNIDO Li Yong praised the cooperation between China and UNIDO in a talk before a group at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington on Tuesday.

The meeting came one week after UNIDO held its 15th general conference in Lima, Peru, and adopted a new roadmap that re-emphasized UNIDO's core goals.

The first Chinese government official to head a major multilateral agency, Li said his experience witnessing how his own country had lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty in the last three decades gave him a firm commitment to the fact that "accelerating the drive to a more inclusive and sustainable pattern of industrial development is key to achieving a high-level of prosperity in all countries".

According to Li, China and UNIDO have maintained 40 years of cooperation, during which numerous programs have been implemented, centers created, and advice provided for the government to address industrial development.

"In the 1980s, UNIDO helped China's State Council to send out study groups to countries like Ireland, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia to learn how to open up, how to attract foreign investors, and how to build industrial parks, which was a very hot topic back then," Li said.

Li also said that in 1989, UNIDO set up an international cooperation center in Beijing aimed at promoting international cooperation and introducing FDI in the country. "It was not an easy process," Li recalled. "Investors wouldn't come when policies and regulations weren't there."

"So these are not the kind of practices that China invented," Li said. "We learned from others and we continue to bring the best practices and incorporate them into our own situation. That is something really amazing about China."

With the help of UNIDO, China has built up a South-South Cooperation Center that organizes a number of workshops annually for developing countries to share experiences in their individual industrial development. "Ministers from Africa and Asia are invited to share experiences and they go home knowing what they need to do," Li said.

As recently as Nov 10, Chinese President Xi Jinping expressed his support for UNIDO when he met with Li during the Third Plenum, saying that he especially appreciated UNIDO's contribution to China's reform and opening up process and that he would continue to support the organization's work.

In a video message to UNIDO's General Conference last week, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang not only reiterated President Xi's support for UNIDO, but also reasserted China's commitment to a new form of industrialization that goes hand-in-hand with UNIDO's blueprint of inclusive and sustainable industrial development.

Acknowledging the strong support from China, Li said his organization would provide more policy advice for China to implement, including clean technology to reduce emissions and more efficient use of resources.

"I think the Chinese government will welcome those kinds of suggestions," Li said. "China benefited greatly from the 350 programs that UNIDO has implemented, and more programs are underway."

According to Li, the Chinese government has committed a four-year $20 million voluntary contribution to UNIDO, followed by Russia who will contribute $2.6 million annually. India, Poland and some Arab countries have also expressed an interest in contributing more to the organization.

"I appreciate the Chinese government's support for UNIDO, particularly from the president ," said Li, adding that he hoped other countries would follow China's lead.

Deng Xianlai contributed to this story.