Manzhouli's opening-up efforts starting to bear fruit

Li Zheng was just a local fruit-stall owner in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region nearly a decade ago.

Today, the 41-year-old owns a business selling 50,000 metric tons of fruit and vegetables annually, around one-tenth of the total fresh-food exports of his home town Manzhouli, in the region of Hulunbuir which borders Mongolia to the west and Russia to the north.

His dramatic expansion of Yikeli Fruit Trade Co into one of the largest trading companies in the area started in 2006 as Manzhouli was chosen as a national pilot city to boost trade with these two bordering countries.