Christchurch has several relationships with differing cities and provinces in China.     

Christchurch’s Canterbury region – China’s Gansu province

This sister city relationship celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2014, making it one of Christchurch's oldest sister city relationships in China. It was initially formulated by renowned activist and New Zealand socialist Rewi Alley, who spent most of his adult life in China. Christchurch established a relationship with Gansu’s Lanzhou city, and Selwyn district established a relationship with the province’s Shandan county. Cooperation through this relationship has included a professional staff internship dispatched by Gansu Foreign Affairs Office to work in Christchurch, a fellowship program sponsored by Gansu province for young New Zealanders, and a New Zealand English Teacher working in a Lanzhou foreign language school. Christchurch recently hosted a Gansu delegation in honor of this anniversary. The delegation was led by Feng Jian, chairman of the Gansu People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). This relationship is currently exploring increased opportunities for economic cooperation and technological exchanges.

More information available:

 http://www.ccc.govt.nz/thecouncil/SisterCities/GansuProvince.aspx

Christchurch – Wuhan

This sister city relationship will celebrate its 10th anniversary in 2016. This relationship was originally founded upon increasingly close trade and economic links that have since expanded to education and tourism. Additionally, relationships between several universities in Wuhan and Christchurch on the perspective of academic cooperation in scientific matters in Antarctica have strengthen the sister city relationship between Christchurch and Wuhan. Wuhan Mayor Tang Zhiliang is expected to visit Christchurch following the New Zealand - China Mayoral Forum in Auckland on Friday 21 Nov.

More information:

http://www.ccc.govt.nz/thecouncil/SisterCities/Wuhan.aspx

Developing relationships with Sichuan province

Christchurch/Canterbury has had exchanges with Sichuan province on how to cope with earthquakes due to the frequency of earthquake occurrences in the two respective regions. Presently, the cooperation between the two has extended to investment and education.

Developing relationships with Guangdong province

Currently there are several strategic relationships developing between Christchurch/Canterbury and towns/cities in Guangdong province. There is a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in place between Christchurch Educated (http://www.christchurcheducated.co.nz/) and the Guangdong provincial education department in a bid to facilitate teacher and student exchanges between the two sides. There is also a cooperation agreement between Canterbury Employers Chamber of Commerce and Zhongshan Enterprises Investment and Development Association. Air travel is also increasing between the two regions, with China Southern Airlines out of Guangzhou flying one direct charter flight to Christchurch in 2014, and three direct charter flights into Christchurch in 2015. It is hoped that a regular direct air link between the two cities will follow soon.

The relationships above are maintained by a combination of the International Relations Team at Christchurch City Council, the China branch of the Canterbury Development Corporation, the Christchurch-China Sister Cities Committee, and the NZ-China Friendship Association. In addition, other organizations in the fields of culture, trade, tourism and education also promote and maintain of these relationships.    

Lastly, the Transitional Cities project does not currently have entries in any other international awards besides the Guangzhou Urban Innovation Awards.