A reception for the 2026 Spring Festival was held on Friday at the Consulate General of China in Auckland, New Zealand, where a promotional video for China Media Group's (CMG) 2026 Spring Festival Gala was showcased.
The Spring Festival Gala, also known as "Chunwan" in Chinese, has been a major cultural symbol for the Chinese New Year celebrations in China since its debut in 1983. It will be broadcast live around the world on the Chinese New Year's Eve on February 16.
Chinese Consul General in Auckland Chen Shijie said in his address at the reception that high-level exchanges between China and New Zealand became more frequent over the past year, with fruitful results yielded in pragmatic cooperation. In 2025, the trade volume between China and New Zealand exceeded 21.4 billion U.S. dollars, a year-on-year increase of 6.4 percent. China has been New Zealand's largest trading partner, export market, and source of imports for 12 consecutive years.
To encourage people-to-people exchanges, China has extended its unilateral visa-free policy for New Zealand, and New Zealand offers visa-free access to Chinese tourists holding Australian visas, Chen said.
Nancy Lu, a member of the New Zealand Parliament, also spoke at the event and said that she had deeply felt the momentum of the New Zealand-China relationship in areas such as trade, science and technology, education, culture and local exchanges.
She added that she hopes the relationship between the two countries would become closer and more stable.
A variety of cultural performances graced the reception, including the playing of Guzheng, a Chinese plucked zither, various martial arts performances, and a dance by a humanoid robot to a popular Chinese song.
A large projection screen played the promotional video for the Spring Festival Gala, and guests gathered around them to view together and appreciate the cultural essence of the Chinese New Year.
"It's wonderful, wonderful to see so many Chinese people, so many New Zealand people celebrating. Of course, that's the magic of China actually, lots of beautiful celebrations, all about beautiful things: health and luck and good families and so on and so forth. Very, very nice, very exciting. I love every minute of it. Actually, I very love it, because I love China and I really admire and respect the Chinese leadership because in a world where everyone seems to be making trouble, they are trying to unite people and they are peaceful. And they want a peaceful, prosperous world. Happy Year of the Horse!" said Mike Dawson, president of the New Zealand China Friendship Society.
Consulate General of China in Auckland holds Spring Festival reception
