China to Accelerate the Opening-up of Western Inland Region

The first China-Eurasia Expo is coming to a close in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Some 50,000 officials and business people from China and about 30 countries, regions and international organizations attended the five-day trade fair.

The Expo was upgraded this year from a regional trade fair that aims to make Urumqi an important exchange center for leaders and businesses in China and its western and southern neighbors. It is also aimed to help speed up the opening-up of China's western inland region.

Liu Yan has the story.

The Alataw Pass is in the western border region that connects China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region to its western neighbors. During the China-Eurasia Expo, some 3.7 billion yuan, or almost 580 million US dollars, worth of deals were signed involving the Alataw Pass region alone.

The director of Alataw Pass Economic and Trade Bureau points out that the China-Eurasia Expo provides more opportunities for the region and its people.

"We have gained the expected results in which three projects on the manufacture of the minerals imported from Kazakhstan in Alataw Pass, and another one on the achievement of the memorandum with chief representatives of the Ministry of New technologies in Kazakhstan."

The director of Xinjiang International Expo Bureau, Li Jingyuan also agrees that the China-Eurasia Expo speeds up the development of Xinjiang greatly as it promotes the construction of cross-border infrastructure projects like roads, railways, and telecommunication networks to explore the full potential of trade across the heartland of Eurasia.

Xinjiang Yu'ang International Trading Corporation is the only enterprise engaged in the research and development, manufacture and sales of semi-conductors in Xinjiang. Jiang Fang, the manager of this company, says that the Expo plays a vital role in promoting the company's international status.

"Last year, we have only applied one ordinary stand, while this year, we applied four special stands to expand our popularity as the trade fair was upgraded to the China-Eurasia Expo. Comparing to the result of last year, our signing bonus doubled including the cooperation with the foreign countries such as Kazakhstan, South Korea, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan."

The success of China-Eurasia Expo is key in China's overall opening-up strategy and will accelerate the opening-up of western inland region.

For CRI, I'm Liu Yan.