Workers of the China Road and Bridge Corporation (CRBC) survey at a construction site in the Gilgit-Baltistan region of northern Pakistan, March 24, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]

The Chinese company employs as many as 4,000 locals during the busy months of the project and it has also trained thousands of locals to be engineers or technicians.

However, there is still a larger picture as to the significance of the road project: it is estimated that by September this year, the central section of the Karakoram Highway that has been blocked after a massive landslide five years ago will be reopened for traffic and that would halve the travel time from the Raikot Bridge to the Khunjerab Pass to seven hours, said Wen Gang, chairman of the CRBC board of directors.

The renovated highway will greatly contribute to China-Pakistan cooperation in trade, energy, and boost social and economic development along the route, said Wen.

Sikandar Sultan Raja, former chief secretary of Pakistan's northern region of Gilgit-Baltistan, also hailed the enormous potential of the newly renovated highway.

While noting that the 2010 landslide blocked the highway and that has dented bilateral trade via road in the past few years, he said the soon-to-come unobstructed traffic along the route will allow larger areas in both China and Pakistan to achieve win-win results and common development.