>>>Click into related Special: The 2nd ICIF & GD Culture

Liu Shaoxin, president of the center, toasts with foreign dealers after the dealers signed contracts totaling US$208 million yuan with two local companies, all customers of the center.

After months of preparation, the Second China (Shenzhen) International Cultural Industry Fair will make a grand opening today (May 18) at the Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center, the main venue of the fair.

All the 4,500 booths in the nine exhibition halls at the center have been booked as expected, according to a press conference held yesterday. The number of exhibitors at this year's fair is more than 1,500, twice the number of the first fair held in 2004, and includes 26 foreign cities. An estimated 21,000 cultural industry professionals, including around 3,400 from foreign countries, will attend the four-day fair.

The fair will put special emphasis on promoting themes like "China concept" and "Created in China" to help Chinese cultural products and services trade overseas, said Wang Jingsheng, director of the Publicity Department of the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the CPC. The function of the fair as an export platform is both necessary and timely, as China has seen a serious trade deficit in the cultural industry. The ICIF is expected to help reverse that trend.

Guangdong has a prominent presence at the fair with 398 exhibitors, accounting for nearly 30 percent of the total. At a press conference yesterday, the province's culture officials announced that the industry had become a new pillar industry of Guangdong, with the added value of the cultural and related industries reaching 120.54 billion yuan (US$15.06 billion) in 2004, accounting for 20 percent of the country's total.

The fair will feature a conference on projects seeking investment, and this is especially important in light of the decision by the Central Government in August last year to allow private capital to enter the cultural industry. To aid investors, the fair has released a resource bank of cultural industry projects that seek investors, according to Wang Yongzhang, director of the Cultural Industry Department under the Ministry of Culture.

This year's fair also stresses on the importance of the protection of intellectual property rights (IPR). An intellectual property protection office has been established in the fair to handle complaints on IPR violations. The Shenzhen Intermediate People's Court has also set up a special channel to deal with piracy cases.

The six subvenues of the fair -- the Shenzhen Curio World, Shuibei International jewelry Trade Center, Manjing Sino-Art Exhibition Center, Yijing National Cartoon and Animation Industry Base, Artron Art Gallery, and Dafen Oil Painting Village were opened to public starting Tuesday.

Editor: Yan