Chinese firms' increased outbound investment has benefited the recipient countries, a senior Chinese Ministry of Commerce (MOC) official said Monday.

Chen Jian, Vice Minister of the MOC, said at a press conference Chinese firms' overseas investments have helped recipients countries by developing their human resource pool, promoting their industrial upgrading, and fostering their ability to develop independently.

Chinese enterprises have not only invested funds in and transferred technology to some countries, they have also paid taxes and created jobs.

Chinese firms making overseas investments paid 10.6 billion U.S. dollars in taxes to overseas governments and employed 438,000 workers at their overseas operations in 2009, Chen said.

In 2009, Chinese outbound direct investment rose 1.1 percent year on year to 56.5 billion U.S. dollars, as Chinese enterprises established 13,000 overseas companies in 177 countries with combined assets of over one trillion U.S. dollars, Chen said.

Through cooperation in the sectors of natural resources and energy, China's enterprises also assisted other countries raise the added value of their resource products, boosting their economic development, he said.

Investment-recipient nations have also benefited from Chinese firms' investment in infrastructure and financial credit support, Chen said.

Since 2000, Chinese companies have built in African countries 70 million square meters of housing, 60,000 kilometers of roads, and power generation facilities with an installed capacity of 3.5 million kilowatts, Chen said.