He said that the Russian Business Day is an important event of the 18th China Harbin Fair for Trade and Economic Cooperation.

Razov said the fair is not only a trade platform for businesspeople from both countries, but also a stage for investment and production cooperation.

The Russian Business Day wrapped up on Saturday with 21 projects worth more than $1.5 billion inked between the two countries.

Liu Xueliang, vice-governor of Heilongjiang Province, which shares more than a 3,000-km border with Russia, said that much potential remains to be unleashed in China-Russia trade.

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"The current trade volume still lags far behind and fails to match the economic and technological standards of both countries," he said.

China-Russia trade volume is only about a sixth of that between China and the United States; and a quarter of that between China and the Republic of Korea, he said.

Liu said that one of the most important reasons is the lack of large-scale projects between the two countries.

Also over the weekend, Valery Solomonovich Gurevich, vice-chairman of the Government of Jewish Autonomous Region of Russia, said that China and Russia will start the construction of the first railway bridge over the Heilong River (called Amur in Russia) - the border river - at the end of this year.

The bridge will be built from Nizhneleninskoye of the Region to Tongjiang, in Heilongjiang Province. The 2,197-meter-long bridge, with an estimated investment of nearly 6 billion rubles, ($230 million), is expected to be finished by the end of 2010, Gurevich said.