A new Chinese Development Cooperation Fund for Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) countries, with a starting capital of $1 billion has officially been established, the Macau Government Information Bureau said.
Promoted by the Chinese government along with the China Development Bank and the Macau Industrial Development and Commercialisation Fund (FDIC), the operation and management of the Fund will be the responsibility of the China-Africa Development Fund, which is part of the China Development Bank, as it has vast experience in investment management.
The value of the first package of funding provided to the fund is $125 million, provided by the China Development Bank, Capital Corporation Limited ($75 million) and the FDIC ($50 million).
According to the official statement, the Fund will focus on the investment and financing needs of companies from the Chinese interior (including Macau) and from Portuguese-speaking countries. It will focus on supporting Chinese companies to enter Portuguese-speaking markets and attracting companies from these countries to China.
The statement said that given Macau’s unique historical and cultural context, the territory was a platform to link China and the Portuguese-speaking countries.
In 2012 trade between China and Portuguese-speaking countries totalled $128.5 billion, which was a rise of 9.6 percent year on year.
