Visitors have fun at the Ice-Snow World in Harbin, northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, Jan. 5, 2024. (PHOTO: XINHUA)

By TANG Zhexiao

After "southern little potatoes" – “Ice City” Harbin’s affectionate nickname for visitors from the warm southern cities – went viral on domestic social media, the capital of Heilongjiang province in China’s cold northeast became an internet celebrity city at the beginning of 2024.  

When the annual International Ice and Snow Festival kicked off in Harbin on January 5, it added steam to the city's burgeoning ice and snow tourism.

Frozen in real life

Dubbed "Ice City", "Oriental Moscow" and "Oriental Paris", Harbin has built its landmark theme park, the Harbin Ice and Snow World, this year with 250,000 cubic meters of ice. 

The park’s ice sculptures such as bridges, fairy-tale castles and towers are built from ice blocks from the frozen Songhua River nearby. When it gets warmer, they melt and flow back into the river without any pollution.

The park also uses an advanced inflatable membrane construction technology, which is green and environmentally friendly, and has good fire resistance and strong thermal insulation.

This incredible ice city in China is "raising the brrrrr for a tourist attraction,” the Daily Mail wrote.

Harbin tourism in vogue

Pakistan Samaa TV reported that Harbin's ice and snow festival has broken records and the ice city experienced a tourism boom over the New Year.

The festival has become a winter wonderland illuminated by vibrant lights at night, said Geo TV, another Pakistan-based TV station, adding: "The festival's success marks a crucial revival for Harbin's 'ice and snow' economy, with this year's winter proving to be a pivotal season for the city's tourism industry."

The Harbin Ice and Snow World has also successfully made it to the Guinness World Records as the largest ice and snow-themed amusement park.

According to their official statement, "The largest ice and snow theme park (temporary) measures 816,682.50 square meters and was achieved by Harbin Ice and Snow World (China) in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China, on December 31, 2023."

India’s private TV station NDTV said this icy wonderland "features more than 2,000 carefully made ice and snow sculptures that capture the imagination of those who visit. The park's greatness is highlighted by the fact that it took a huge team of over 10,000 builders working hard for over a month to create this icy spectacle."

Besides infrastructure, Harbin's authorities have improved the city’s accommodation and are holding a variety of activities including live performances, fireworks displays, and parades by ethnic minorities in their colorful traditional clothes to enhance the tourist experience.

Ice and snow economy surges 

Heilongjiang's culture and tourism department called Harbin’s tourist boom an "ice and snow miracle." Official data shows that in the three-day New Year holiday, Harbin attracted a record number of more than three million tourists, and achieved a total tourism income of 5.9 billion RMB (824.5 million USD), another record high.

"The tourism boom occurred as China's services activity expanded at the fastest pace in five months in December, lifting optimism in the sector to a three-month high," Reuters reported. 

Over the years, Harbin has been discovering new economic growth in cold resources and developing the industrial chain of its ice and snow economy. 

The winter season is always a peak tourist period in northeastern China. Especially after the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, according to South China Morning Post, "domestic ice and snow tourism has experienced an incredible surge."

Harbin has a unique geographical location that enables it to have a five-month ice and snow carnival. Here, ice and snow are a natural resource, cultural symbol, economic power and innovation engine, PR Newswire commented.  

According to data from the culture and tourism department, the scale of Harbin's ice and snow economy exceeded 70 billion RMB (9.8 billion USD) from 2022 to 2023. 

As the ice and snow economy achieves a breakthrough and sustains it, Harbin’s success in turning natural resources into economic gain provides a good lesson to promote the revitalization of not only northeast China in the new era, but other places in East Asia as well.