The governor of the State Development Bank (SDB), Chen Yuan, said on December 20 the bank will issue more loans to central and western China to step up economic development of those regions.

Chen made the remark at the opening ceremony of the Lanzhou branch of the bank, the 27th SDB branch in the country. Lanzhou is the capital of Gansu Province in northwest China.

Since its founding five years ago, the bank has granted nearly 400 billion yuan in loans for the construction of a large number of key local and state projects in the central and western regions of the country, Chen said.

These projects include the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia natural gas field, the Lanzhou-Xinjiang railway, power stations on the Yellow River, oilfields and metallurgical plants.

Chen added that loans for central and western China account for more than 60 percent of the bank's total loans annually.

In northwest China alone, the bank has granted 35 billion yuan in loans Qinghai and Gansu provinces and the Ningxia Autonomous Region over the past five years.

Founded in March 1994, the State Development Bank is the largest policy bank in China with assets totaling 600 billion yuan. (Xinhua)