Chief of China's major bank ICBC, Jiang Jianqing, said on Thursday that he believes China will continue increasing investment in Africa which is mutually beneficial.

"With the development of economic globalization, China will have more and closer business links with the rest of the world, which will finally lead to increasing oversea investment from China. Therefore, I believe more investment with mutual benefits will come to Africa," said Jiang in a joint interview with Jacko Maree, group chief executive of the Standard Bank Group.

Jiang was the chairman of the board of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), also the only co-chair from China of the 19th World Economic Forum on Africa which is being held here from Wednesday to Friday under the theme of "Implications of the Global Economic Crisis for Africa".

The ICBC has purchased 20 percent of interest in the Standard Bank, the largest in South Africa.

For the economic crisis, Jiang said one important lesson people should learn is the necessity of strengthening global financial monitoring. "The crisis is a devastating result of the loss of financial regulation and monitoring. We must step up such move in the whole world and between countries," said Jiang, adding that no national boundary can be found in the capital market of the world.

Jiang expressed satisfaction with the cooperation with the Standard Bank which enjoys good working teams. "We have common recognition about management culture and the way to deal with risks with the Standard Bank. That paved way for the final decision to cooperate. I can say now it is a right move and the two sides have good communication and share identical cooperation strategies," said the co-chair.

Jiang also revealed that the cooperation list of ICBC and the Standard Bank has covered more than 60 projects. "The list will become longer and longer," Jiang beamed, highlighting his bank's imminent signing of US$800 million funding of a power station in Botswana.

On the ICBC, Jiang said the bank was also under great impacts of the global economic crisis, which can be proved by the ICBC's growth in profits of 6.1 percent in the first quarter of this year compared with the corresponding period last year.

"The annual profit growth rate has stood at 37.5 percent on average in the past six years. But the 6.1 percent growth in the first quarter is a fairly good achievement compared with the performance of other banks in the world," said Jiang, adding that the quality of ICBC assets are also sound.

He termed the economic stimulus policy taken by the Chinese government as effective, saying the situation in China has improved since the end of the first quarter.

The World Economic Forum on Africa is scheduled to end on Friday. The talks attracts over 800 participants from 50 countries.

Five African leaders have taken part in the meeting, including Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Amolo Odinga, Lesotho's Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosislili, Rwandan President Paul Kagame, newly-elected South African President Jacob Zuma and his Zambian counterpart Rupiah Bwezani Banda.

Participants of the forum has tried to seek practical solutions to foster better business practices and greater investment across the continent.

The closing plenary session of the platform scheduled for Friday afternoon will highlight the outcomes of the meeting and map out the future engagement of main stakeholders.

(Xinhua News Agency June 12, 2009)