A booming expo industry in recent years is proving to be a powerful engine for economic development in northeast China.

Expos of all kinds - trade, manufacturing, investment and automobiles, to name just a few - create tens of billions of dollars in revenue each year for northeast China, according to local government statistics.

The northeast region, including Heilongjiang, Jilin and Liaoning provinces, produced China's first batch of steel, machine tools, locomotives and planes after the founding of New China in 1949.

However, many traditional industrial enterprises gradually lost their competitive edge and some have been losing money for 20 years as China has shifted from a planned economy to reforms and opening-up.

When China decided to rejuvenate the old industrial base in 2003, expos have spurred local economic development.

Shenyang, capital of Liaoning Province, has garnered more than 10 billion yuan (US$1.25 billion) from industries like tourism and transportation, thanks to the China Shenyang International Horticultural Exposition, which opened on May 1, said a government official in charge of expos.

In the past two years, the city has hosted an average of two expos per month, according to the official. Over 20 percent of the expos are international.

Direct revenues from the exhibition industry reached 720 million yuan (US$90 million) in 2005 in Changchun, provincial capital of Jilin, said Song Lihua, director of the city's expos office.

Income from expo-related industries hit 6.5 billion yuan (US$812.5million), Song said.

A big international exhibition center was commissioned in 2003 in Harbin, capital of Heilongjiang Province, giving the city the capacity to host large expos, said Wang Liwei, deputy director of the Heilongjiang Branch of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade.

Northeast China is shoring up its position as the country's fourth exhibition base, following Chinese business hub Shanghai, capital Beijing and southern city Guangzhou, according to the latest survey by the Ministry of Commerce.

The booming expo industry in northeast China has driven the rapid development of other sectors, especially the tertiary industry, which will in turn contribute to the revival of the old industrial base, experts say.

(Xinhua News Agency September 23, 2006)