North China's Shanxi province will focus on furthering opening up its markets and economy to the outside world in 2020, according to the Shanxi Department of Commerce.

The province will promote the opening up of its airports in Taiyuan and Datong cities and speed up the process in Yuncheng airport. Officials said it will continue to increase international air routes and plans to open direct air service between Taiyuan and Japan.

Wusu Comprehensive Bonded Area in Taiyuan, the first of its kind in Shanxi province, will build designated inspection sites for fruit and chilled seafood products and develop five major businesses: regional processing and manufacturing, research and development, logistics, inspection and maintenance and sales services.

Officials said Shanxi will support the local Zhongding Logistics Park to apply to build bonded warehouses and designated inspection sites for imported finished vehicles as well as operating China-Europe freight trains -- while backing Yuncheng, Xinzhou and Datong cities in establishing export platforms for fruit, grains and meat respectively.

In addition, Shanxi will prepare for the China (Taiyuan) International Energy Industry Expo this year, to develop it into a well-known international exhibition brand and communications and cooperation platform in the energy sector.

Shanxi Department of Commercesaid that, generally speaking, the levels of opening up in Shanxi province improved last year. From January to November, the value of goods imports and exports was 131.19 billion yuan ($19.06 billion), a year-on-year increase of 3.4 percent, which was 1 percentage point higher than the national growth rate.

There were 405 more companies involved in imports and exports. Foreign investment in the province totaled $1.08 billion, of which 54.8 percent went to the manufacturing industry.

Over the past year, Fortune Global 500 companies invested in 89 projects in Shanxi. The turnover of the province's internationally contracted projects hit $1.16 billion, a year-on-year growth of 18.5 percent, versus a national decline during the same period.