Since the policy of reform and opening up was adopted in 1978, the economy of Xinjiang has undergone rapid development. The fastest development and greatest changes took place at the end of the ninth five-year plan period. Since the strategy of western region development was implemented in 2000, the state has increased investment in Xinjiang, giving more support to the development of infrastructure facility and basic industry projects. As a result, a rapid growth is maintained in fixed asset investment. In the period 2000—2002, the total volume of fixed asset investment in the entire region reached 6.10 billion yuan, 7.02 billion yuan and 8.12 billion yuan respectively, an average annual increase of 15.4%. A number of major projects were built and put to use, such as Northern Xinjiang Railway, Southern Xinjiang Railway, the Parallel Line of Lanzhou—Xinjiang Railway, the Turpan—Urumqi—Dahuangshan Highway, the Urumqi—Kuytun Expressway, expanding and rebuilding of Urumqi International Airport, communication fiber cable of Xinjiang and hydro junction. Infrastructure facilities such as transportation, energy and post and telecommunication, and basic industries saw a big progress.
So far, major railway lines with shape like “Y” have been built in Xinjiang, passing through main economies of Xinjiang. The northern Xinjiang railway has been an important section of the second Asia-Europe Continental Bridge. By the end of 2002, the operating kilometer of railway had reached 2770 km, including alternate railway lines 752 km. A network of highway with Urumqi as the center has been shaped. By the end of 2002,the traffic mileage of highway has reached 82882 km. The undertaking of civil aviation of Xinjiang develops rapidly. By the end of 2002, there had been 13 civil airports and 2 general airports. Urumqi International Airport is one of the five largest airports of China and 74 international and domestic airlines have been opened for the airport with over 150,000 km of air route in use. 8 air routes were successively opened from Urumqi to foreign cities such as Almata, Moscow, Taskent, Biskek, Islamabad, and New Siberia. In 2002, the total business volume of postal and telecommunication reached 9.47 billion yuan, 58 times higher the 1990 number. It is convenient for major cities of Xinjiang to exchange information with domestic and foreign cities. The telephone penetration rate has reached 98.3% and 56% respectively at the township level and the village level. Xinjiang is very rich in resources of energy. There are 104 power plants with installed capacity of 600 KW or above. The annual energy output of Xinjiang has reached 19.72 billion KWH.
