Enterprises in Shanghai can find more opportunities in the vast inland regions and expand their national markets as the fair lures more inland businesses to join in," said Du Gongpu, one of the chief organizers.

The fair, held annually in Shanghai since 1991, will run from Sunday to next Saturday at Shanghai Mart and Shanghai Intex. It has been billed as a significant event to promote textiles and other light industries in East China, the two main industries in the region.

Though sponsored by nine provinces and cities in East China, the fair has transcended regional borders and wooed more and more enterprises from inland areas, which believe the fair can help them to find more products, access more trade channels and business advice, and help them to build up their brandnames and expand their overseas exports.

"Co-operation between the eastern and the western regions via the fair can help the less-developed regions to grow their economies, shortening the gap between the rich and the poor and build up China's economy as a whole," he said.

The fair will also be a good chance for Chinese enterprises to exchange business with overseas companies as more and more overseas businesses are signing up to join the fair, Du said.

The organizing committee has helped boost foreign participation by sending a visiting group on a foreign trip every year to promote the fair and invite more foreign businesses to join in. Their efforts have paid off with overseas exhibitors increasing in numbers at the fair.

After opening the exhibition to foreign business last year, this year's 50 booths have been leased out by companies from the United States, Germany, Japan, Russia and other countries.

Du said the fair will be further upgraded to become more specialized with its focus on exhibiting products of light industry including textiles and garments, as well as arts and crafts, following in the global trend in fairs to become more specialized.

At this year's event, 70 per cent of the exhibits will be in the textiles, garments and other products of light industries.

The exhibit area now stands at about 50,000 square metres. A brand new exhibition hall, with an exhibiting area expected to cover 150,000 square metres, is under construction in Pudong, which will help the fair to expand further, Du said.