Cancun, Mexico - China wants to be 'self-sufficient' in the production of vaccines against the new A(H1N1) influenza virus, and plans to have a vaccine available by September, Chinese Health Minister Zhu Chen said Friday.

'We are producing the vaccines, we have 10 pharmaceutical industries involved in the vaccine's production and manufacturing. I think maybe in September (they will be) ready to be further evaluated,' Zhu told the German Press Agency dpa on the sidelines of the global summit on the new flu in Cancun, Mexico.

The Chinese minister said that 'some of the human resource companies' in China are in the process of the initial manufacturing of a vaccine. A preliminary version is likely to be ready by the end of this month, he noted.

'By September I think we will have the first results of the safety evaluation,' Zhu said.

By then, China hopes to be able to produce at least 13 million doses, equivalent to 1 per cent of its population of 1.3 billion people.