More than 150 guests showed up at the film launch reception held by Tony Browne, New Zealand Ambassador to China, to celebrate the broadcasting of a five-part documentary series about New Zealand on CCTV-10's best known documentary program block "Exploring", starting from November 10, 2006.

Zhang Changming (L), Vice President of CCTV, delivers a speech as New Zealand Ambassador to China (second from left) looks on. [chinadaily.com.cn]

Among the guests are visiting New Zealand Minister of Trade and Defense Phil Goff, Director General of International Co-operation of SARFT Ma Xuming, Vice President of CCTV Zhang Changming and formoer Chinese Ambassador to New Zealand Chen Mingming.

The series entitled New Zealand Journeys is a co-production between CCTV-10 and award winning documentary production company NHNZ (Natural History New Zealand).

Cinema industry in New Zealand has drawn world attention because of the success of blockbusters such as Lord of the Rings Trilogy and talented directors like Peter Jackson, and there have been a huge number of TV programs made about different aspects of New Zealand and its multi cultural society, but this series is the first series of documentaries about New Zealand tailor made for the Chinese TV audience.

New Zealand Journeys will showcase the unique and diverse cultural heritage of New Zealand, its innovations and contributions to the world and the long friendly relationship between China and New Zealand, especially the valuable contributions that the Chinese community has made to the development of the country. The stories of the films are: New Zealand's Natural Treasures, People Paradise, the Chinese in New Zealand, New Zealand Innovations and Cinema of New Zealand.

Ambassador Tony Browne said in his speech at the reception that the New Zealand Journeys is a result of the hard work of television producers of both China and New Zealand and the high quality documentaries are the first cultural diplomacy programs between New Zealand and China, to be followed by the Te Papa exhibition that will tour four major Chinese cities, Beijing, Shanghai, Wuhan and Guangzhou, starting from March 2007.

Zhang Changming, Vice President of CCTV, who just came back from a visit to New Zealand, praised the series as a bridge of friendship between the peoples of China and New Zealand.

The production of New Zealand Journeys was supported by the Cultural Diplomacy International Program of the Ministry for Cultural and Heritage of New Zealand. Helen Clark, Prime Minister of New Zealand, also Minister of Arts, Cultural and Heritage, said that she hoped the production and screening of the films will enhance the friendly relationship between China and New Zealand. She also hoped that this project will be the beginning of closer co-operation between the screen industries.

PM Helen Clark visited CCTV in June 2005 where she and Minister Wang Taihua discussed ways of further the co-operation between TV and film industries of China and New Zealand.

China and New Zealand will be celebrating 35 years of diplomatic relations in 2007. New Zealand boasts three "firsts" with China: New Zealand was the fist developed country to recognize China as market economy; the fist to complete bilateral negotiations in respect to China's WTO accession; and the first developed country to start free trade agreement negotiation. According to Clark, Zealand hopes to become the first developed country to sign the free trade agreement with China and that both sides have indicated their commitment to achieving a "comprehensive, high quality and balanced agreement."

NHNZ is one of the largest documentary production companies of the world, which has been very actively involved in co-producing documentary films about China with local partners for the international market in the past 7 years. Most of their films about China have enjoyed great successes in the market and have played a positive role in helping the international community to gain a greater understanding of China's rich history and the exciting changes happening in China now.

Growing Up Giant Panda, which tells the touching story of raising giant panda baby, is a co-production with China International Communication Center(CICC), will be screened on Animal Planet, which reaches audience in over 150 countries later in the year. Another co-production between CICC and NHNZ The World Highest Railway, tells the remarkable engineering story in building the Qinghai Tibet Railway was premiered on Discovery Asia this week.

Michael Stedman, Managing Director of NHNZ, said "We are very privileged to be in the documentary business, as documentaries can travel across language and cultural barrier and build up bridges of understanding between people. We have been very active."

Michael Stedman, Managing Director of NHNZ, said "We are very privileged to be in the documentary business, as documentaries can travel across language and cultural barrier and build up bridges of understanding between people. We have been very active in telling stories of China to the rest of the world. The New Zealand Journeys is the fist time that we turn the cameras on ourselves. It has been a great pleasure working with my colleagues at CCTV, it is their creative contribution that makes this series so special. Our key focus in China is to make documentaries about this wonderful country for the world audience. We certainly look forward to working with them more in the future, to bring more great stories of China to the living rooms of millions of TV viewers across the world."