Dancers perform during the opening ceremony of the German-Chinese Culture Year of Inner Mongolia 2017 at the China Culture Center in Berlin, capital of Germany, April 14, 2017. The German-Chinese Culture Year of Inner Mongolia 2017 kicked off in Berlin on Friday, as part of a series of cultural activities to commemorate the 45th anniversary of the establishment of the Chinese-German diplomatic relations. (Xinhua/Shan Yuqi)
NEW ERA OF PROSPERITY
Inner Mongolia covers an area of 1.18 million sq km, or about 12 percent of the country's land area. The Mongolian population is 4.6 million, nearly one-fifth of the region's total.
Over the past seven decades, the region's economy has expanded from 537 million yuan to 1.86 trillion yuan, ranking first among the country's five autonomous regions. Its foreign trade volume increased from 11 million dollars to 11.7 billion dollars over the same period.
Trade and cultural exchange were boosted by the ancient Silk Road routes during the era of Genghis Khan and the Yuan Dynasty. In recent years, the sharply increasing China-European freight trains traveling via Erenhot and Manzhouli ports in Inner Mongolia have invigorated the grassland Silk Road.
A daily average of three freight trains pass Manzhouli Port, China's largest land pass, making up about 70 percent of China-Russia freight trade. The port is the busiest in China in terms of cross-border freight trains.
Last year, 1,036 inbound and outbound freight trains went through Manzhouli Port, an increase of 88 percent year on year, carrying goods worth 3.6 billion dollars, according to Manzhouli Customs.
"As a key hub along the grassland Silk Road, Manzhouli will continue to play a leading role in the region's opening-up," said Gao Wenhe, vice mayor of the city.
Sun Yulong is a Mongolian entrepreneur who opened a Russian food company in Manzhouli, in cooperation with a Russian firm in 2015. "I plan to build another plant in the Manzhouli free trade zone to produce more Russian-style food for Chinese consumers," he said.
