Yangzhou expanding global profile

Yangzhou, a renowned historical and cultural city in China, is looking to boost its international profile.

On Nov 22, the city won the bid to host the 2022 World Athletics Half Marathon Championships, making it the second Chinese city (after Nanning in 2010) to host the biannual 21.0975-kilometer race since it was first launched in 1992.

The city was designated as a UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy ahead of World Cities Day on October 31, becoming the fourth city in the nation after Chengdu, Shunde and Macao to receive the title.

On August 30, Yangzhou, along with South Korea's Suncheon and Japan's Kitakyushu, was listed as a Culture City of East Asia 2020 after cultural ministers from the three countries met in Incheon.

On Sept 27, the 2019 World Canal Cities Forum and World Canals Conference opened in Yangzhou, gathering representatives from over 20 countries and organizations worldwide to discuss the preservation of the canal's legacy.

David Edwards-May, president of Inland Waterways International, said that the most admirable thing about Yangzhou is that it not only spearheaded the application for World Heritage status for the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, but also helped form a global "canal community" to find answers to sustainable development.