BEIJING, March 8 (Xinhua) -- China Development Bank (CDB) will step up financial support for the country's key cultural industry projects during the 2011-2015 period, according to a memorandum of cooperation it signed Thursday with the Ministry of Culture.

According to the memorandum, the CDB will introduce favorable initiatives for key cultural firms and projects recommended by the ministry, including opening the "green corridor" to ease the handling of their loan applications.

The culture ministry will make greater efforts to guide financial support or investment from banks and social capital into the development of the cultural industry.

Moreover, both sides will cooperate to explore ways for cultivating backbone enterprises in the cultural sector and helping China's efforts to forge cultural groups with independent intellectual property rights, famous brands and considerable international competitiveness, according to the memorandum.

They will also work together to support the development of quality cultural firms and projects, including national-level cultural industry bases and major cartoon and animation enterprises.

As a major bank supporting the cultural industry, the CDB in 2011 has granted a total of 38.1 billion yuan (around 6 billion U.S. dollars) to the sector. The bank pledged to provide more than 200 billion yuan in financing support to China's cultural industry before 2015.