This year's fair included 2,000 indoor and 600 outdoor booths covering 20,000 square meters. Exhibition pavilions ranged from hi-tech and investment, to food, arts and crafts, garments, machinery and electric products. Other events include those for transnational procurement, energy saving and environmental protection, financing and pollution-free food. The next Harbin Trade Fair will be held from June 15 to 19 next year. Harbin extends its warmest welcome to guests from all over the world.

Three Phases of Harbin Trade Fair

Begun in 1990, Harbin Trade Fair has grown into a large international expo authorized by the Chinese Government and now is seen as an important forum for investment and technological cooperation in northeast Asia. Over the years, the aggregate number of guests attending the fair surpassed 1.4 million, reaching a total estimated trade value of over $100 billion.

Its development has gone through three phases.

1990-91: It was set up as a regional trade fair only targeted at the former Soviet Union and the east European countries. A commodity-for-commodity exchange system was the major trade measure. Total trade contracts were valued at $5 billion.

1992-95: The former Soviet Union collapsed, hence the fair was renamed as China Harbin Border and Regional Trade Fair, focusing on the neighboring countries around Heilongjiang Province. Attendants started to use currencies to trade commodities. The fair gradually attracted guests from Japan, South Korea and Southeast Asian nations, as well as traders from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. On June 18, 1995, the then Chinese president Jiang Zemin, when visiting Heilongjiang Province, encouraged Harbin to promote the fair into an international-level trade gala, pointing to a new direction for the fair. Aggregate trade contracts were valued at $33.9 billion.

1996-present: The fair was renamed International China Harbin Fair for Trade and Economic Cooperation, focusing on Russia and covering the whole world. The aggregate trade volume was valued at over $100 billion.