Japanese Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba is expected to start a two-day visit to Beijing on Wednesday, his first trip to China since taking office in September.

Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi and State Councilor Dai Bingguo are due to meet Gemba, whose visit comes ahead of next year's 40th anniversary of the normalization of bilateral diplomatic ties.

Gemba is expected to call for the early resumption of talks on reaching an agreement on the joint development of natural gas fields in the East China Sea, according to Japanese media reports.

The talks have been suspended since September 2010, after Japan detained a Chinese fishing boat that collided with Japanese coast guard ships near China's Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea.

In the wake of the incident, bilateral relations "deteriorated to their lowest level" in late 2010, according to Kyodo News Agency.

Ties began to warm up when China sent aid to Japan after it was hit by a 9.0-magnitude earthquake and the tsunami and nuclear crisis that followed in March.

The stalled Six-Party Talks, too, may be a topic of discussion during Gemba's visit. The talks have been postponed since the Democratic People's Republic of Korea pulled out in 2009.

Gemba may ask China to ease restrictions on imports of agricultural products from Japan that have been in place following the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in March.

His visit will pave the way for a trip to Beijing by Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda in mid-December. Noda, in his meeting with President Hu Jintao in Hawaii last week, said bilateral ties are important not only for the two countries but also for the world.

Hu said both countries should handle existing disputes with "consensus and understanding", with a focus on dialogue.