BEIJING — China has set up a green channel for payment and clearing businesses to ensure the timely transfer of money amid the fight against the novel coronavirus outbreak, a central bank official said on Feb 15. 

During the Jan 24-Feb 14 period, a total of 393,500 payment transactions were handled through the high-value and micropayment systems of the central bank, involving an amount of 77.37 trillion yuan (about $11.06 trillion), said Fan Yifei, deputy governor of the People's Bank of China (PBOC), at a press conference.

Of the total, 872 payment transactions or 44.8 billion yuan were related to the prevention and control of the epidemic, Fan said.

On Feb 3, the PBOC extended the operation period of the high-value payment system, whose operation is usually suspended during the Spring Festival holiday, to meet the demand of interbank market trading and special re-lending businesses.

The central bank has taken measures to strengthen the cash supply and liquidity management, with 4 billion yuan of new banknotes being allocated to Wuhan city, the epicenter of the outbreak, according to Fan.

The PBOC will work to firmly implement the supportive financial policies for the epidemic control and support qualified enterprises to resume production and operation as soon as possible, he said.