The Ferris wheel at the Harbin Ice and Snow World Photo: IC PHOTO

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“Ice and snow are as valuable as gold and silver,” remarked General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee Xi Jinping at the welcome banquet for the opening ceremony of the 9th Asian Winter Games on Feb. 7 in Harbin, northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province. “The ice and snow culture and economy are becoming a new driving force for the high-quality development of Harbin and a new bond linking the city and the world.”

While athletes performed exceptionally in the event, its theme—“Dream of Winter, Love among Asia”—was fully embodied throughout its preparation and execution, showcasing the unique appeal of ice-snow culture.

Promising ice-snow culture

Ice-snow culture represents a cultural system shaped by humanity’s interaction with frigid environments. As a regional cultural form, it predominantly thrives in cold regions north of the 40th parallel. China boasts a rich and enduring ice-snow heritage—from bone skates discovered at the Neolithic Xinglongwa Site in Aohan Banner, Chifeng City, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, to horsehide skis used by Turkic tribes in the Tang Dynasty (618–907), and from the appointment of “Royal Icemen” in the Zhou Dynasty (1046–256 BCE) to the majestic ice skating festivities in the Qing era (1644–1911). These elements illustrate how ice-snow culture has been interwoven with Chinese civilization for millennia.

A unique resource endowment of northeast China, ice-snow culture serves as a key pillar of regional economic development. The global ice-snow economy currently exceeds $600 billion, with China’s ice-snow industry projected to reach a trillion-yuan scale by 2025.

As climate change and sustainable development intertwine, China’s ice-snow economy is growing at an average compound annual rate of 15%. Acting as a key catalyst for economic vitality, ice-snow culture is forging a new framework for Chinese modernization, characterized by the symbiosis of culture and the economy.

As the nation’s traditional industrial base, northeast China has faced structural economic challenges, including an overreliance on outdated sectors. Leveraging the region’s deep-rooted ice-snow culture to drive the ice-snow economy and integrate it with tourism presents a promising pathway for the high-quality development and full revitalization of the region.

As a defining cultural emblem of northeast China, ice-snow culture enjoys widespread domestic recognition and influence. Its distinctive charm extends beyond its tangible forms in the region to its profound cultural implications and spirit. Generational traditions like winter fishing, intricately crafted ice and snow sculptures, and vibrant winter sports events reflect the innovative, open, cooperative, and inclusive spirit of people in northeast China, alongside their qualities of frankness, courage, and resilience.

Boosting regional economy

Expanding the scope of ice-snow culture and creating new cultural formats will further accelerate the region’s ice-snow economy. In recent years, Heilongjiang Province has vigorously promoted ice-snow culture while advancing the full industrial chain of the ice-snow economy. By integrating winter tourism and sports with local folk traditions, the province has attracted an influx of tourists and investors from both inside and outside the province.

The success of the 9th Asian Winter Games Harbin 2025 has provided huge opportunities for regional economic development. Data reveals that during the event, the number of orders for related travel packages soared over 388% year-on-year, while inbound tourism orders with Harbin as the destination rose 157%. Visitors from Russia, the United States, Hungary, South Korea, and Thailand increased substantially, as many local specialty restaurants saw a sharp rise in patronage. This economic boom, in turn, has spurred a flourishing of ice-snow cultural activities.

On the policy level, national and local guidelines have offered institutional guarantees for the synergistic development of ice-snow culture and economy. In 2024, the Office of the Central Leading Group for Coordinated Regional Development issued the “Implementation Plan for Promoting the High-quality Development of the Ice and Snow Economy in Northeast China to Achieve New Breakthroughs in Full Revitalization.” This plan outlines a whole-industry-chain approach, detailing 15 key tasks and measures across ice-snow tourism, sports, culture, and equipment, while clarifying the development priorities of the region’s ice-snow economy. Additionally, the plan introduces targeted policies in talent cultivation, investment and financing, land security, and international exchanges, creating a favorable environment for ice-snow economic prosperity.

Meanwhile, the “Ice and Snow Economic Development Plan of Heilongjiang Province (2022–2030)” envisions the establishment of a diversified “ice and snow+” synergistic development landscape by 2030, involving various industries, expanding and strengthening the core ice-snow industry, and improving the greater industrial ecosystem. The plan aims to establish a Heilongjiang model with international influence, embodying General Secretary Xi Jinping’s remarks that “ice and snow are as valuable as gold and silver.” Liaoning, Jilin, and Inner Mongolia have also unveiled corresponding policy initiatives.

Looking ahead, northeast China should, with greater confidence in its ice-snow culture, intensify cultural innovation and technological empowerment to foster a virtuous circle of “cultural prosperity, industrial upgrade, and regional revitalization.” Through policy coordination, brand internationalization, whole-chain industrial integration, and other means, the region’s “cold resources” can generate “heat effects,” injecting sustained momentum into the full revitalization of China’s northeast.

Jin Gang is a research fellow from the Institute of Literature at the Heilongjiang Provincial Academy of Social Sciences.

Edited by CHEN MIRONG