On September 2, the Xiabaiyan Buyi Ethnic Minority Water Dwellings Cultural Museum which is located in Libo county, Guizhou province and established with the exclusive donation from China Construction Bank Corporation (CCB) formally opened. It is another major step of CCB, as a listed company, to contribute to the society.

Located in the southwestern part of China, Guizhou province boasts rich cultural and tourism resources. To tap such resources and improve people’s living standards, Guizhou has made great efforts in promoting the tourism industry, accelerating the agricultural restructuring and exploring the effective way of building new socialist countryside. The Xiabaiyan Buyi Ethnic Minority Water Dwellings Cultural Museum established with donation from CCB is composed of the main exhibition hall, family museum, information center, functional rooms and the surrounding natural environment of Shuichunhe Gorge and ethnic villages. The museum mainly displays the cultural relics related with the farming and water dwelling culture, traditional agriculture and handicraft industry of Buyi ethnic minority, historical sites and rural scenes. Xiabaiyan Buyi ethic villages are located in the central scenic spot of Libo county, Qianzhou prefecture, Guizhou province. As part of the South China Karst Zone, Libo is the only “World Natural Heritage” site applied by the Chinese government this year, which has passed the initial review. 2006 is the “Year of Countryside Tourism” declared by China National Tourism Administration. The Guizhou Province Countryside Tourism Plan formulated recently selectes 12 demonstration villages in the province, and Xiabaiyan Buyi village is the first demonstration project under construction. 

A CCB official said that building new socialist countryside is our due responsibility and making donation to establish the Water Dwellings Cultural Museum is only the first step of CCB to that end. It is hoped that the support of CCB will help the countryside of Guizhou achieve the goal of protecting the natural environment and folk culture, reducing poverty by promoting tourism and developing the rural community.

The same source also noted that the reform and development of CCB will be impossible without the support of the society and the customers. As the first state-owned commercial banks completing overseas listing, CCB, within less than 1 year after IPO, has been incorporated into the Hang Seng China Enterprises Index and Hang Seng Index Constituents and become the first H share company incorporated into Hang Seng Index. The Britain-based journal The Banker rated CCB as the “Best Chinese Bank of the Year 2005”, the Hong Kong-based journal Asiaweek rated CCB as the “most profitable bank in Asia” and CCB ranked the 65^th among the 2006 Fortune top 2000 global listed companies. In the future, CCB will, as always, serve the national economic construction and at the same time actively support public welfare to contribute to the building of a harmonious society. CCB also sincerely hopes the society will continue supporting its growth and making efforts to build the bank into a modern financial institution with international competitiveness.