A special fund with a start-up capital of US$200 million has been set up today to further promote co-operation and development between China and the Portuguese-speaking countries.

The signing ceremony was attended by the Secretary for Economy and Finance, Mr Tam Pak Yuen, the Vice Minister of Commerce, Mr Jiang Zengwei, and other guests. Representatives from the Secretariat of China and Portuguese - Speaking Countries Economic Cooperation Forum (Macao), and the China Development Bank signed the memorandum.

The fund, with US$50 million dedicated by the Macao Government, will be registered in the Cayman Islands and will be managed by the China Development Bank Capital Corporation Ltd.

Mr Tam said he expected the registration process to be completed within this year.

The total scale of the fund is US$1 billion and was firstly proposed by Premier Wen Jiabao at the Third Ministerial Conference of the Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-speaking Countries held in 2010.

This is one of the six important measures suggested by China, aimed at providing preferential loans for participating countries from Asia and Africa, as well as training for their officials and technical staff.

Participating Portuguese-speaking countries are Portugal, Brazil, Angola, Monzambique, Timor Leste, Cabo-Verde and Guiner-Bissau. Together in 2011 their exports to Macao totalled MOP3,660,387, with imports from Macao at MOP417, 934, 437.