OREANDA-NEWS. March 05, 2013. The China Development Bank (CDB) and the China National Cereals, Oils and Foodstuffs Corporation (COFCO) signed a developmental financial cooperation agreement in Beijing.

CDB will provide COFCO with a credit facility of 30 billion yuan in the next five years to help COFCO accelerate the development of its cereals, oils and foodstuffs business, enhance the buildup of its fully integrated value chain, effectively safeguard national food security, and help promote "three rural" development. CDB Chairman Chen Yuan and COFCO Chairman Ning Gaoning attended the signing ceremony, and CDB Vice President Yuan Li and COFCO President Yu Xubo signed the cooperation agreement on behalf of the two sides respectively.

Under the agreement, CDB will give full play to its comprehensive financial service advantages in investment, lending, debt, leasing, and securities by giving priority to helping COFCO improve its capabilities in cereals, oils and foodstuffs processing and circulating so as to safeguard domestic supply of cereals, oils and foodstuffs as well as food security and to maintain price stability for important agricultural products.

At the same time, the two sides will join hands in developing the rural financial market, explore a new modern rural financial model of sustainable development, provide funding support for agricultural development, improve the professional level of agricultural operations, push forward the establishment of a new type of agricultural enterprise relationship, strengthen the comprehensive production abilities of China's agriculture, promote rural economic and social development, and improve farmers' living standards.

This cooperation agreement is an important measure for CDB and COFCO to implement the spirit of the 18th CPC National Congress and the 2013 Central Document No.1 and to serve the national strategy. The two sides will, in accordance with the requirements of "synchronized development in industrialization, informatization, urbanization, and agricultural modernization", give full play to the leading role of leading enterprises, and continually deepen implementation to achieve innovative breakthrough with COFCO's "fully integrated value chain" strategy. They will also work to stabilize and develop agricultural production, innovate agricultural operating system, strengthen rural financial service, improve the efficiency of agricultural production and agricultural product circulation, and promote increases in grain production and farmers' income so as to safeguard the steady food supply and national food security.

As a major bank in China's medium- to long-term investment and financing field, CDB has adhered to serving the national strategy with market-oriented means, actively explored developmental financial practices, and played an important role in supporting the development of infrastructures, basic industries, and pillar industries, and promoting the transformation of the economic development mode, the development of people's livelihood as well as international cooperation. In recent years, CDB has implemented central spirit by continually increasing its support for the "three rural" and people's livelihood areas. As of the end of 2012, CDB's agriculture-related lending balance stood at about 765 billion yuan. Issuing 135 billion yuan in new rural construction loans and 21.6 billion yuan in agricultural loans last year, CDB has given its strong support to new rural and county-wide infrastructural construction and the development of leading enterprises of agricultural industrialization, rural health care, education, and modern agriculture.

China's largest integrated agricultural and cereals, oils and foodstuffs processing enterprise, COFCO has been among the Fortune 500 for 19 consecutive years and is ranked No.1 among the Top 100 in China's food industry. In the process of pushing forward its "fully integrated value chain" strategy, COFCO has built a system of "big processing, circulation, sales and service". By 2012 COFCO's annual comprehensive agricultural product processing capacity had reached 51.76 million tonnes. It has built eight large purchasing platforms and nine marketing and sales platforms in key domestic production and sales areas, with annual cereals, oils and foodstuffs sales of 20 million tonnes and a comprehensive domestic market share of over 10%. In 2012, COFCO's agricultural orders covered a size of 3.275 million mu, involved 12 million farmers, and increased farmers' income by 1.63 billion yuan. Through its subsidiaries Longjiang Bank and rural banks, COFCO has also provided financial support for farmers and agricultural cooperatives with 37.5 billion yuan in cumulative disbursed agriculture-related loans, which have benefited more than 6.5 million farmers.