BEIJING. Dec 1 1 : China's huge US trade surplus can lie solved gradually on the basis of growing Chinese consumer demand, economics supremo Zhu Rongji was quoted by Xinhua news agency as saying. reports Reuter.

"I'm optimistic about all this." the vice premier and powerful Communist Party leader was quoted on Saturday as telling the US journal China information.

Xinhua did not says when the Interview took place.

The United States says its bilateral trade deficit with China Is soaring toward 35 billion dollars in 1995 compared with 30 billion dollars in 1994. prompting economists to predict it soon will surpass the US trade gap with Japan.

Washington blames a wide range of tariff and non-tariff barriers that keep US exporters out of the Chinese market.

Such barriers are a key reason cited by US officials for barring China’s coveted entry to the tariff-busting World Trade Organisation.

Zhu said the trade imbalance was "not a serious problem" and that priority should be given to political ties in the effort to improve bilateral relations. Xinhua reported.

This should be followed by the increasing of economic cooperation, Zhu said.

The United States is a huge country with many kinds of export commodities." Zhu said. ’’Its economy is complementary with China in certain ways."

Zhu singled out trade in farm produce to illustrate the prospects of trade between the two countries.

"With rapid improvement of the Chinese people's livelihood, there is huge demand for grain and forage."

"During the period of development. China will import certain amount of grain and the two countries have a broad prospect in this field." he said.