Current Time in Fangchenggang, China

Fangchenggang lies in the far south-west of China, in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, on the shore of the Gulf of Tonkin and close to the border with Vietnam. The city occupies a coast of deep inlets, wooded peninsulas and mangrove-fringed estuaries, backed inland by the forested Shiwan Dashan range, sometimes translated as the mountains of ten thousand ranges. Its combination of sheltered deep water and a land frontier has made it one of the most strategically placed ports in southern China.

The prefecture has a population of around one million, with several hundred thousand in the main urban area. The port is the reason for the city's rapid growth, handling iron ore, coal, grain, timber and containers, and serving as a gateway for trade between China and Southeast Asia. Steel, aluminium, chemicals, food processing, shipping and a nuclear power station form the industrial base, while fishing, aquaculture, tropical fruit and cross-border commerce at Dongxing support many families. The city is designated as a key node of the corridor linking western China with the sea.

The coast has been settled for a very long time, and the region formed part of the frontier zone between Chinese dynasties and the states of what is now Vietnam. Trade and migration crossed the border in both directions for centuries. The modern city is recent, however. The port was developed from the 1960s, initially to move aid southwards during the Vietnam War, and Fangchenggang was made a prefecture-level city only in 1993, since when it has expanded enormously with new districts, highways and industry.

Visitors are drawn first to the sea. The beaches at Baisha and along the peninsulas are quiet, and the Beilun Estuary nature reserve protects one of the finest mangrove forests in the country, rich in crabs, mudskippers and migratory birds. Inland, the Shiwan Dashan national forest park offers waterfalls, hot springs, hiking trails and cool air among subtropical forest. At Dongxing, on the border, a bridge crosses to the Vietnamese town of Mong Cai, and the markets sell Vietnamese coffee, dried seafood, spices and handicrafts in a lively mixture of languages.

The area is culturally unusual. It is the home of the Jing people, the only officially recognised ethnic Vietnamese minority in China, who live on three former islands now joined to the shore. They maintain their own language, their striking single-stringed zither and the Ha festival of singing, feasting and offerings to the sea. Zhuang, Yao and Han communities live alongside them, and the local cuisine features fish sauce, rice noodles, oysters, sea snails and dishes that clearly reflect both Chinese and Vietnamese traditions.

High-speed trains connect the city with Nanning and the coastal cities of Beihai and Qinzhou, expressways run to the border, and the airports of Nanning and Beihai are within easy reach. Vocational colleges serve the port and industrial sectors, with universities concentrated in the regional capital.

Fangchenggang is important as China's border port on the Gulf of Tonkin and as a meeting place of cultures.