China, US reach agreement on infrastructure deals

But challenges to cooperation between the world's two largest economies remain: for example, the slow progress of the Sino-US BIT talks, insufficient strategic mutual trust, language barriers and cultural gaps, and a lack of understanding on each side of the other's investment environment, the CCIEE report said.

"The BIT negotiations must speed up, and we expect them to be concluded by the end of 2015," said Wei Jianguo, vice-chairman of the CCIEE. "Meanwhile, we should introduce innovations and use the gains from China's accession into the World Trade Organization to accelerate the BIT talk process."

Myron A. Brilliant, executive vice-president and head of international affairs of the USCC, said the business community sees the BIT as "steppingstones to even bigger things in the relationship".

"We talked about ultimately hoping to have a US-China Free Trade Agreement, not something that can be accomplished in the short term, but longer term, it should be the aspirations not only of the business communities but of the two governments," he said.

"We even talked about having a step, in between the BIT and FTA, to promote a BIT-plus-trade element. All this reflects that there is a lot of ongoing negotiations between China and the US," Brilliant added.

The two sides also agreed to consolidate the WTO system, including expanding and concluding the Information Technology Agreement, according to a joint statement on the dialogue.