Vice-Premier Li Keqiang pledged on Wednesday that the central government will do its best to help reconstruct the Dongfang Steam Turbine Plant in Mianzhu, Sichuan, which was badly damaged by last Monday's quake.

"The rebuilding of the plant, however, should not lead to relocation of the ordinary people," Li said during a visit to the quake-hit turbine maker, a unit of the Shanghai-listed Dongfang Electric Corp.

Li Rongrong, head of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC), said on Wednesday that the commission will make it a top priority to help the plant resume normal operations.

Dongfang Electric suffered the most among the more than 150 central enterprises supervised by the SASAC.

Hanwang town, where the Dongfang plant is located, is one of the most seriously-hit regions.

Chen Xinyou, deputy general manager of the plant, said that about 100 of the 5,000-odd employees died; and the total death toll including families killed in the residential compound was about 400.

The plant has secured a total of 2,000 mu of land (133 hectares) in Deyang economic development zone and the Tianyuan economic zone, both in Sichuan, for reconstruction, Chen said.

Meanwhile, the company has negotiated with private firms in the economic zones to form a partnership to assist its efforts to restore production.

"By six months, we will recover about 80 percent of our pre-quake production capacity," Chen said. "We will operate in full swing within two years."

Chen said the management of the plant has rented new offices and started to work in Deyang but its registered office will continue to be in Mianzhu, thereby contributing to the tax revenues of the hard-hit region.

(China Daily May 22, 2008)