China's Ministry of Finance said Monday it plans to auction two batches of local government bonds from Tuesday.

On behalf of 12 provinces and municipalities, the ministry will sell 47 billion yuan (US$7 billion) of local government bonds, including 28.4 billion yuan of three-year bonds at a fixed yield of 2.37 percent and 18.6 billion yuan of five-year bonds at a yield of 2.67 percent, a statement posted on the ministry's website said.

The bonds will be sold via the national inter-bank bond market and the stock market between August 10 and August 12 and become tradeable August 16.

China plans to sell 200 billion yuan of local government debt this year.

The country began issuing local government bonds last year to help finance its 4-trillion-yuan stimulus package.

The ministry also said it will start to sell on August 16 some 20 billion yuan of treasury bonds, comprising of 12 billion yuan of one-year bonds and 8 billion yuan of three-year bonds.

The one-year bonds will carry an annual interest rate of 2.6 percent and the three-year bonds will have an interest rate of 3.73 percent.

(Xinhua News Agency August 10, 2010)