(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-01-16 15:51

CHENGDU - Another 10 of the Fortune 500 companies began investing in southwest China's Sichuan Province last year, bringing the total number to 135, local government statistics show.

TNT Post Group (TPG), ING Group, Morgan Stanley, Home Depot, Bertelsmann AG and five other world-renowned companies on the Fortune 500 list were among the newly approved businesses, statistics with the Sichuan Provincial Department of Commerce show.

The province had approved a total of 8,271 foreign-funded businesses by the end of last year, with a contractual capital of US$21.66 billion and an actual investment of 9.41 billion dollars.

The province attracted 1.77 billion dollars in actual foreign investment in 2007, growing sharply by 40.7 percent from a year earlier.

"The ever-improving investment environment and the vast consumer market in west China are among the main reasons for foreign businesses to choose Sichuan for investment," a spokesman with the provincial commerce department said.

He cited that foreign business people used to spend at least five days in getting approval from local authorities to set up companies in the hi-tech zone in the provincial capital of Chengdu, but now, they only need four hours at most.

He also said that a number of newly added direct flights between Chengdu and cities in Europe and southeast Asia have offered a favorable logistics environment for foreign business people.

In addition, eight countries, including the United States, Germany, the Republic of Korea, Thailand, France, Singapore and Pakistan, have established diplomatic missions in Chengdu, which have become important links between Sichuan and foreign businesses.