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The opening ceremony of the First International Cultureal Industry Fair Shenzhen

Liu Yunshan, minister of the CPC Publicity Department (Left 2), Sun Jiazheng, minister of the Ministry of Culture, PRC and  Huang Huahua, governor of Guangdong Provice at the opening ceremony

The First International Cultural Industry Fair Shenzhen, which opened at the China Hi-Tech Fair Exhibition Center on Thursday, attracted attention from home and abroad and was deemed a showcase of China's cultural industries.

Liu Yunshan, member of the Political Bureau under the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and head of Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, and Sun Jiazheng, minister of culture, attended the opening ceremony.

Other distinguished guests included former prime minister of Japan Kaifu Toshiki, Star TV CEO Jamie Davies and some consul generals of Guangzhou.

More than 700 enterprises took part to explore more spheres of cooperation while seeking total investment worth 38 billion yuan (US$4.56 billion).

Hall A is occupied by Digital TV Industry Exhibition, assembling an array of well-known cultural and media enterprises. Hong Kong has an area of 246 square meters to show its cultural industries.

Other exhibitors include CCTV, Star TV, Poly, Skyworth, Founder, TCL, Huawei, CETV, Panasonic, Sony, Phoenix TV, China Unicom and CNC. The OCT Enterprises Co., a brand name for managing theme parks in Shenzhen, has employed more than 100 performers to give six shows a day during the fair.

Hall D is for exhibitions of radio, film, TV exchange programs and audiovisual products, media brand marketing and international animation caricature. Some national audiovisual product manufacturers such as Creative Production, UCE Group, Toptimes and colorland Animation have booths here. Three car brands, Citroen, SAAB and Cadillac, are also promoting their latest models in this hall.

B1 and B2 are for mainstream graphics media and selected international books. An array of media organizations has booths in this hall. The Hong Kong-based Sino United Publishing (Holdings) Ltd. has 40 booths with books for utilities, reference and education including 3,000 English books. A booth with the slogan "The Best German Book Design" showcases the best German book designs in 2003.

A German brand in printing equipment, Heidelberg, has a booth displaying its latest printing machine PM52, which attracted many visitors Thursday.

B3 houses Chinese culture and examples of world cultural heritage. Despite dozens of national cultural heritage sites and folk arts on display, there are also some novel exhibits, such as a bamboo scroll, an English edition of the ancient Chinese book The Art of War, 1.6 meters long and 23 cm wide. A booth displaying a compass chariot of the Yellow emperor also caught the eye. The display also includes mainstream sculptures and Daoguang XXV tributary liquor.

Hall C displays more than 160 Chinese calligraphy works and paintings by well-known Chinese artists.

Between Hall A and D is the Shenzhen Curio World exhibition occupying some 250 booths.

The fair also has separate venues at Dafen Village and Nanshan District.

Editor: Catherine