Khorgos extends beyond shipment hub

Among the organizers was the representation office of China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism in Nur-Sultan. The office’s head Mrs. Wang Shulin says Khorgos is key to the Chinese Chairman’s “One Belt, One Road” initiative.

“With visa-free, visa-on-arrival agreements signed with 65 countries, China seeks to establish new contacts and come along with new initiatives on cooperation with Kazakhstan”, Mrs. Wang said.

She expressed the confidence that joint work of Kazakh and Chinese people could lead to the conditions as well as the platform for cooperation between both countries’ companies.

The Kazakh side was represented by Kazakhstan’s national company “KazakhTourism” led by Deputy Chairman Timur Duisengaliyev.

In his speech he referred to the week-long Kazakh-Chinese Tourist Cooperation Forum held in May this year, stressing that such events contribute to the development of tourist cooperation between the countries, bringing it to a new level. Nevertheless, a certain scale of issues arises, including logistics, infrastructure, translation quality, and so on.

“China is of interest not only because it is the tourist power, the world’s largest market that is capable of generating immense flows, but also because of trans-border regions. What makes Khorgos exceptional is that it is a gateway of the western China and western Europe road. It is also the biggest gateway into Kazakhstan and does not run to its fullest capacity”, the KazakhTourism Deputy Chairman said.

He pointed out the importance to open up Khorgos for tourists, calling for working out a mechanism for collaboration and ensuring access. 

He went on stressing China’s developed domestic tourism area.

“Given Xinjiang’s tourist flow of 80 million domestic tourists and the close distance between Urumqi and Almaty region, 1 per cent of those tourists is quite a big tourist flow for Kazakhstan”, he said.

On the sidelines of the event National Company “KazakhTourism” signed a cooperation agreement with Khorgos’s Management of Culture and Tourism, focusing on stepping up tourism resources, pushing the regional tourist projects forward, and setting up a platform to strengthen contacts and cooperation between both countries’ tourist companies.

The cooperation leads to the development of trans-border tourist routes with the holding of regular events on trans-border tourism, investment attraction as well as cultural and sport competitions, aiming at upskilling courses to ensure quality tourist services as well as boosting the economic situations in the long run.

Adlet Seilkhanov