BEIJING, Aug 28 (Reuters) - China and Singapore are planning to launch a private equity fund focused on investments in the high-tech sector in the region surrounding Shanghai, state media said on Tuesday.

The China-Singapore Hi-tech Industrial Investment Fund is nearing approval from China's economic planning agency, the National Development and Reform Commission, the China Daily said.

The new fund would channel money into the China-Singapore Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP) to help it shift focus towards more high-tech and value-added products, the paper said.

"Apart from the SIP, it will also seek opportunities in the Yangtze River Delta," the region around Shanghai, it quoted a source as saying.

The industrial park's administration had applied for permission to raise 10 billion yuan ($1.3 billion) in funds, 3 billion yuan of which would come in the first phase, the paper said.

It added that China Life Insurance Co and China Development Bank, one of the country's three policy lenders, would probably be among the fund's investors.

The fund would become China's second industrial investment fund after the Bohai Industrial Investment Fund, which is based in the northern port city of Tianjin and focuses mainly on investments in the Binhai New Area, an economic zone there that is being used as a base for market-oriented reforms.