Wal-Mart has signed a contract with Dalian Huanan Co. (Group) to open its ninth chain store in China. This will be the second chain store to be opened by Wal-Mart in Dalian City.

The new Wal-Mart chain store is scheduled to open in April, 2001 with a floor space of 21,000 square meters, the biggest of all Wal-Mart chain stores in the world.

Wal-Mart has opened eight chain stores in China's Shenzhen, Dongguan, Kunming, and Dalian with a total investment of 1.1 billion yuan (US$132.5 million).

As the world's largest retailing chain store company, Wal-Mart owns 4,000 chain stores in nine countries. It was ranked second on the top 500 list of companies published by Fortune Magazine in 1999.

Beijing Mayor Liu Qi Monday expressed a welcome to Wal-Mart to open a chain store in Beijing by saying that the retail sector has bright prospects in the Chinese capital.

(People’s Daily 11/15/2000)