As the investors of the newly-built Yongfu Hydroelectric Power Station in Rongjiang County of southwest China's Guizhou province, Wu Huiming and Ye Huajie spent a memorable Spring Festival this year.

With Wu and Ye's investment of 40 million yuan (about US$4.82 million), the power station with a total installed capacity of 7,500 kw began operation at the beginning of the Chinese Traditional lunar New Year, which fell on Feb. 1.

The two investors were born in Jingning She Ethnic Autonomous County in the south of Zhejiang Province, the only autonomous county in east China. Jingning is a mountainous area and was on the country's list of 140 poor ethnic minority counties.

The local government has used every means possible to tap its resources and has made considerable progress in developing small- and medium-sized hydro-electric power stations.

With the support of the country's poverty-relief plan, a number of local residents like Wu and Ye have become rich by participating in or investing in the construction of power stations in recent years.

As China implements its western development strategy, these "adventurers" with rich experience in developing the power industry are setting their eyes on provinces in the middle and western parts of China with abundant waterpower resources, such as Hunan, Jiangxi and Guizhou.

Wu Huiming said that investing in power stations in western China can bring many talents and advanced technology and management methods to these areas so as to help develop the local economy.

Chen Fuwang, a former peasant from Jingning, invested 115 million yuan (about US$13.86 million) in constructing the Xiahuikeng Hydroelectric Power Station with an annual power output of 53 million kilowatt-hours in Shangrao County of east China's Jiangxi Province.

Together with an investment of 25 million yuan (about US$3 million) from the local government, the project was listed as one of the key projects of Jiangxi Province.

The power station has been built and put into use. It is expected to turn in tens of millions of yuan in revenue a year.

At present, more than 50 businessmen from Jingning have invested more than 400 million yuan (about US$48.2 million) to construct more than 20 small-sized hydro-electric power stations in the middle and western part of China.

(Xinhua News Agency February 12, 2003)