HONG KONG, Aug. 8 (Xinhuanet) -- Mervyn Davies, a senior executiveof Standard Chartered Plc, said on Monday that the Chinese mainland has provided opportunities for the group's long-term development and the group will speed up its development in the Chinese mainland.

Announcing the group's results at the first half of 2005 at a televised press conference, Davies said "in China, we have a three-strand growth strategy --organic growth, selective strategic investment, and taking advances of the many opportunities in the Pearl River Delta, of the world's fastest growth economic zones."

He said their consumer banking business, which was launched in 2003, was already on track.

In the first half of this year, the group's pre-tax profit was up 20 percent to 1.33 billion US dollars and revenues also rose 19percent to 3.23 billion dollars.