FLYING HIGH: Airbus (Tianjin) Final Assembly Co. Ltd., the company's only final assembly line outside Europe, has so far delivered 55 A320 airplanes since it delivered its first plane in June 2009. Eighteen were delivered this year. The company plans to increase its China output to meet the growing air aviation demands in the country (YANG LE)

Funding Medical Reform

The Chinese Government has allocated another 18.4 billion yuan ($2.8 billion) to a subsidy fund to support the nation's medical reform, the Ministry of Finance (MOF) said on July 12.

The new fund brings total subsidies allocated by the Central Government to 171.7 billion yuan ($26.4 billion) so far this year.

Of the 18.4 billion yuan ($2.83 billion), nearly 40 percent, or 7.2 billion yuan ($1.1 billion), will be used to build maternal and child-care service centers, first-aid centers and other public health institutions which specialize in the treatment of tuberculosis and leprosy.

Meanwhile, 4.2 billion yuan ($646 million) will be used to subsidize the purchase of medical equipment by county-level traditional Chinese medicine hospitals and 3.4 billion yuan ($523 million) will be used to subsidize the medical costs of people in both urban and rural areas.

ABC Profit Up

The Agricultural Bank of China (ABC), one of the country's "big four" state-owned commercial banks, said it expects its net profits in the first half of 2011 to jump more than 45 percent year on year.

ABC said the profit surge was the result of stable development, continuous growth in net profit margins and a rapid increase in commission fees and net interest income.

ABC's net profit went up 46 percent to hit 94.91 billion yuan ($146 billion) last year.

Jet Fuel Pricing

China will introduce a more market-oriented jet fuel pricing mechanism starting on August 1, said the National Development and Reform Commission, on July 12.

The move aims to improve the formation mechanism of jet fuel at-cost price.

This at-cost price should not exceed the after-tax CIF price (cost, insurance and freight price) of jet fuel imported from Singapore.

Jet fuel producers and their clients can negotiate the fuel premium and review it once a year when taking into account factors such as the transportation costs, trade volume and international crude oil prices.

Jet fuel producers and their clients can negotiate and re-price jet fuel on the first day of each month.

Currently, adjustments of the country's jet fuel prices require authorities' approval.

Chinese Steel Supplier

The main portion of steel for the east span replacement of the San Francisco Bay Bridge was delivered on July 11 by Shanghai Zhenhua Heavy Industries Co. Ltd., one of China's largest heavy equipment manufacturers.

This is the biggest project so far for the state-owned equipment manufacturing enterprise with a contract worth $350 million, said Kang Xuezeng, President of Shanghai Zhenhua Heavy Industries.

Zhenhua hopes the quality and safety of this project will increase its reputation in the global construction market, Kang said.