The China Red Cross Society (CRCS) received 80 million yuan (US$9,677,614) in donations last year, and was elected a member of the governing board of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRCRCS), CRCS Vice President Wang Lizhong said in Beijing Tuesday.
Wang said this shows China has made great achievements in cause of humanism with China's red cross campaign spreading throughout the country. Red cross societies in Beijing and Shanghai received 16 million yuan (US$1,935,523) and 10.54 million yuan (US$1,275,026) in donations respectively last year. Remote areas represented by the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region also received 3.29 million yuan (US$397,992) due to local red cross' wide-ranging publicity.
CRCS also collected 47.87 million yuan (US$5,790,843) to aid regions in the Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia autonomous regions struck by blizzards as well as flooded areas of Guangxi, which suffered losses reaching 17.48 billion yuan (US$2.11 billion).
CRCS has set up a national bone marrow bank for hematopoietic stem cells and 11 branch banks with test laboratories, aiming to help patients with blood diseases and to carry out prevention research. According to incomplete statistics, 90,000 people have offered to give bone marrow donations and nearly 40,000 samples have been collected.
Activities including poverty-relief and aiding the weak were also carried out by the red cross at all levels.
Wang pointed out that CRCS has established 150,000 branch administrations with 20 million members, among which nine million were young people. Chinese President Jiang Zemin is the CRCS' honorary president.
The international red cross was founded in 1863 and now has 178 member countries. China Red Cross was founded in 1904.
(Xinhua News Agency February 5, 2002)
