Kunming World-Horti Expo Garden celebrates its 20th birthday

The Kunming World-Horti Expo Garden, where China hosted its first world horticulture exposition in 1999, celebrated its 20th birthday on May 1.

Kunming World-Horti Expo Garden covers an area of 218 hectares, with a vegetation coverage rate of 90.1%. It has 2,551 kinds of plants, 112 of which are rare and endangered species.

The 1999 World Horticulture Expo was a collection of distinguished horticulture and gardening landscapes of China as well as 69 countries and 26 international organizations. More than 9.4 million visitors visited the expo, which had helped lift Yunnan’s annual ranking to the sixth place in China in terms of the number of overseas tourists received and the amount of tourism income. Kunming, the provincial capital city, was listed as one of the top ten popular tourist destinations among its kind.

The event has exerted far-reaching influence on the development of Yunnan.

Over the past 20 years, the Kunming World-Horti Expo Garden has continuously optimized its products and improved tourist experience.

During this year's Labor Day holiday, it held a grand celebration to mark the 20th anniversary of its opening. It opened a high-tech "dinosaur park" and held a variety of other recreational activities. According to statistics, it received more than 200,000 tourists during the 4-day holiday.

In the future，Kunming World-Horti Expo Garden will focus on four pillar industries including tourism expo, leisure, cultural and creative industry, and big health industry. Through upgrading and innovation, it aims to develop itself into a landmark of Kunming with multiple functions, and promote the integrating development of city and the Garden.

Text by Han Chengyuan, Li Zha; photos by Zhang Tong