Saudi Basic Industries Corp (Sabic) will resume negotiations with Sinopec Corp to build a major ethylene complex in China, a potential partnership helped by Saudi King Abdullah's visit to Beijing, a Chinese industry official said.

Sabic has in recent years looked at investing in China's fast-expanding petrochemical sector but has yet to land a concrete deal.
Sabic and Sinopec, China's top refiner and petrochemicals producer will start joint-venture talks to build the one million tonne-per-year (tpy) ethylene plant, the official said, without giving details.
In December, Beijing gave Sinopec approval to build a $3.1 billion project that included the ethylene plant and a 250,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) refinery in northern China's Tianjin city by 2008.
"Sabic was among the Saudi delegation during this visit. Now that the government has appro-ved the project, the parties are going to start joint-venture discussions," the Beijing-based official familiar with the development said.
Sabic expressed interest in the Tianjin project more than a year ago, but neither party pursued it in earnest before the investment won government approval, industry officials said.
The official said the visit by King Abdullah, the first by the ruler of the world's largest oil producer to China, gave some push to the project.
Industry officials said cash-rich Sinopec was not desperate for a foreign partner, but the Chinese firm, increasingly dependent on foreign crude oil, may benefit from Sabic's access to cheap oil and gas resources in Saudi Arabia.
Sabic in 2004 also discussed with a private Chinese company to build a similar-sized petrochemical plant in northeast China's Dalian city.
The Middle Eastern firm's interest follows investment by major ExxonMobil Corp, BP Plc, Shell and German BASF in China's petrochemical sector.