Nanjing has a long history of opening up to the outside world. It is where Zheng He decided to embark on and launched the seven voyages down  the “Western Seas”. Between 1405 and 1433, the great Chinese navigator Zheng He led fleets to the sea from Nanjing seven times and visited more than 30 countries and regions in Asia and Africa by passing through Southeast Asia, the Indian Ocean and reaching the Red Sea and the east coast of Africa.

With an increasingly fast rate of opening-up, more than 1 million tourists and business people from overseas come to the city every year, and about 13,000 foreigners work, study and reside in Nanjing on a long term.