HSBC-Tsinghua "Financial Development inChina's Rural Areas" Research Program Workshop 2007 was held duringJanuary 5-6, 2007at Tsinghua SEM. Vice Director of the University Affairs Council He Jiankun, Vice President of Tsinghua University Xie Weihe, Executive Associate Dean of Tsinghua SEM Chen Guoqing, Vice Chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission Jiang Dingzhi, Chairman of HSBC Zhen Haiquan, and President of Beijing Branch of HSBC Ding Guoliang attended the workshop. Participants also included 40 experts in related areas and government officials from regions where researches were carried out. Professor Li Zinai from the Department of Economics of Tsinghua SEM presided over the workshop. Professor Liu Lingling from the Department of Economics, who was in charge of the program, released the "2007 Research Report on Financial Development inChina’s Rural Areas".

The HSBC-Tsinghua "Financial Development inChina's Rural Areas" Research Program was launched in March, 2006. The HSBC has sponsored Tsinghua with a funding of RMB 10 million on a three-year research program concerning Chinese rural finance. The aim of the program is to enable Tsinghua students to better understand the financial service in Chinese rural areas, thus contributing to the economic development ofChina's rural areas and the building of new socialist countryside. The program also provides opportunities for Tsinghua students to go deep into the countryside and approach rural citizens. Research mainly focuses on “the demand of financial service in rural areas”, “current situation of financial services in rural areas”, “factors influencing financial market in rural areas” and “the pattern for commercial bank's entry into rural financial market.”

During the summer vocation of 2006, Tsinghua SEM teachers and students visited more than 170 villages in 29 counties of four provinces, located in middle and western part ofChina. The first-year research output workshop was held at the end of the year 2006.

During the summer vocation of 2007, 17 research groups, made up of 202 teachers and students went to 31 counties(cities) in eight provinces including Hei Longjiang, Jilin, Shanxi, Hunan, Hubei, Henan, Anhui, and Jiangxi to conduct a research focusing on financial development in rural areas and agriculture industrialization. Student collected a large amount of valuable data through their investigation and research on 2,000 households from 150 villages, 50 enterprises and more than 70 financial agencies. Their research reports have been collected in the book"2007 HSBC-Tsinghua SEM undergraduate research prorgam on financial issues inChina's rural areas."