Xinjiang getting back on track
Hard-hit Urumqi more cautious in easing control
Daily life and business activity in Northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the nation’s oil industry base and seat of its fruit and cotton production, are gradually getting back to normal after a second wave of COVID-19 struck in mid-July. Urumqi, the hardest-hit area, is still slowly recovering. But most other areas of Xinjiang are resuming production at full speed to make up for losses a week after restrictions eased.
After the airplane that a Global Times reporter took landed at Korla airport, epidemic prevention staff entered the cabin to check each passenger’s heath code and temperature.
Slogans posted at the airport call on everyone to participate in epidemic prevention and take personal responsibility to fight the disease. They remind people that the region just emerged from a an outbreak.
Korla, the seat of the Bayingolin Mongol Autonomous Prefecture of central and south Xinjiang, which abounds in orchards full of fragrant pears and grapes, is returning to normal.
Crowds have re-emerged in supermarkets. Even as late as 10 pm, people wearing masks are buying fresh fruits and vegetables. Some also take their children, who are either riding in the shopping trolleys or picking snacks alongside their parents. They are required to show their health QR codes and have their body temperatures taken before entering, which is the same as in other Chinese cities.
In Karamay, an industrial city in northern Xinjiang that holds the majority of Xinjiang’s oil and gas industry and serves as node of resources transportation, daily life and production are back on track.
Liu, a senior employee of a subsidiary of China National Petroleum Corp, told the Global Times that during the epidemic, the company adopted closed-off management at its production base, with one-third of the employees (about 1,000) dining and living in the factory complex, to ensure the safe operation of the production chain and normal supply of the city.
Another employee surnamed Sun told the Global Times that the plant’s production capacity of crude oil declined by 90,000 tons, one-fifth of its normal output, in the past month due to the epidemic, and it is now ramping up production.
Cui Tao, the head of Karamay’s Baijiantan district, told the Global Times on Tuesday that Xinjiang learned from the first wave of the virus in late January. “We have prepared, and businesses and markets in the rest of China stayed basically up and running.”
Regional authorities announced plans to restore normal daily activity on September 1. A Global Times reporter observed that the prevention and control measures in the hardesthit location, Urumqi, have not been totally eased.
On Urumqi’s streets, there are more cars and more open stores; residents have returned to workplaces and classrooms, and delivery services have resumed, but restaurants have not resumed dine-in services.