The Chinese businessman behind a $40bn (£26bn) plan to build a canal through Nicaragua has promised transparency and insisted his project is not a joke.

Wang Jing, the owner of Hong Kong-based HKND Group, told reporters he had attracted global investors and that work should start in 2014.

Mr Wang was given a 50-year concession by Nicaragua's Congress last week.

His project has generated a lot of scepticism from industry experts and criticism from environmentalists.

The idea of a canal through Nicaragua has been on the drawing board for more than 150 years.

Mr Wang hopes to build in less than six years a 286km (178-mile) waterway connecting the Caribbean with the Pacific via Lake Nicaragua, Central America's largest freshwater lake.

It would be three times longer than the Panama Canal, which took a decade to complete.