New Zealand / Business

Chinese businesspeople raise millions for Christchurch victims

19:05 pm on 20 March 2019

A group of visiting Chinese businesspeople have raised $2.35 million for victims of the Christchurch mass shooting.

Photo: Supplied

The group were in Auckland at the Teochew International Federation Convention, which promotes business exchange and cooperation, when the incident happened.

This year's convention was being hosted by the Chao Shan General Association of New Zealand. Chairman Colin Zheng said donations were still coming in.

"We'll try our best to raise some more money for the victims in Christchurch because we're all part of New Zealand. We'll try our best to do something for these victims as part of the community," Mr Zheng said.

They hoped to collect all the donations in the next few days and give them to Christchurch Foundation's Our People, Our City fund which was established at the request of the mayor of Christchurch Lianne Dalziel to support the families and Muslim communities impacted by the tragic events, Mr Zheng said.

Givealittle pages have raised $7m with most of them going to the official Victim Support fund.

Muslim crowdfunding site LaunchGood has raised more than $2m, bringing the total amount to more than $11m.

The Teochew International Federation is made up of people from 120 nations, including New Zealand, who have origins in the Teochew area of southern China's Guangdong province.

Yikun Zhang, the current chairman of the board of directors of the Teochew International Federation, who also chairs the board of directors of the Chao Shan General Association of New Zealand, had been under media scrutiny following allegations by former National MP Jami-Lee Ross about a $100,000 donation to the National Party.