Interview with Ningxia Government Vice-secretary Xue Gang

China Ningxia is one of the most important districts along the ancient Silk Road. Xue Gang, the vice secretary of the China Ningxia government believes that the CAEXPO provides a very good platform of cooperation and communication.

Q: As the fortress of the ancient Silk Road, Ningxia is the Chinese “City of Charm” in this year’s CAEXPO. How can it join in with the construction of the 21st Maritime Silk Road?

Xue Gang: Ningxia is a vital region in the ancient Silk Road. Two thousand years ago, Arabs and Europeans carried out their trade by traveling along the posts on our Silk Road in Ningxia. In the future, we will also build an airy Silk Road. Ningxia is the assembly center of Chinese territory. As for the online Silk Road, people know that the development of our age becomes more and more dependent on cross-border electronic commerce which can offer big support for governmental communication, cultural cooperation, and economy and trade contacts among Ningxia, the rest of China, Arabian and Muslim districts, and at the same time the Internet is developing faster and faster. We are now building the largest cloud computing base in China, which is a cooperative strategy agreement signed with Alibaba Corporation.

Q: You have talked about the ancient Silk Road fortress. Could you tell us what are Ningxia’s highlights for the participation at this year’s Expo?

Xue Gang: The 11th CAEXPO this year is called Ningxia “City of Charm”, which is a great kindness and praise to Ningxia given by Guangxi Expo. Our exhibition hall is Hall No. 2. We are presenting Ningxia’s beauty and characteristics by sound, light, and images. At the same time, our many enterprises have brought along lots of products, such as Ningxia Lycium barbarum. Therefore, it is showcased as a series of products in the booths. Besides, the largest type of product from Ningxia is wine. There are over 20,000 hectares of high-quality grape bases in Ningxia, The Xixia King Wine that we are now producing has won golden and other large awards more than ten times. If you are interested, you should visit our booths.

Q:In your opinion, which role does the Expo play in the aspect of pushing cooperation of Chinese provinces and cities, as well as other ASEAN countries?

Xue Gang: CAEXPO provides us with precious experiences to learn from, and these experiences tell us that in building a platform, you should not only focus on local places – namely Guangxi, but also on a larger scale, including our China-Arabian Expo. I think the most noteworthy for us to study is that we should build a platform for the whole nation, as well as other countries and districts. CAEXPO has pushed the cooperation of many enterprises, for the past ten years. I am sure that CAEXPO will become better and better.

Edited by Brian Salter