Fangchenggang’s name means “defence city port”, after a Song-dynasty stockade; today the defenders are police who hike mountain tracks with a dog called Hani, the port takes ships of 200,000 tonnes and four nuclear reactors hum on the coast.
防城港之名意为”防城之港”,源自宋代的一圈木栅;如今守边的是带着一条叫”哈尼”的警犬翻山巡逻的民警,港口可靠泊二十万吨巨轮,海岸上有四台核反应堆在运转。
The city sits at the south-western end of China’s mainland coast, in the corner where a river less than 100 metres wide is the frontier with Vietnam. It was made a city in 1993, around a port that had not existed 25 years earlier.
这座城市位于中国大陆海岸线的西南尽头,一条不足一百米宽的河就是与越南的国界。它一九九三年设市,而围绕的那座港口,二十五年前还不存在。
Few Chinese cities pack so much into so little land: a frontier, a harbour, a power station and a folk opera two centuries old.
很少有中国城市在这么小的地方装下这么多东西:一条国境线、一座海港、一座核电站和一出两百年的民间戏。
A Harbour Built for a War
为战争而建的港
The port exists because of a war. In March 1968 Beijing approved Fangchenggang as the main harbour for a covert sea route to supply North Vietnam, and a wartime wharf at Fangcheng town opened as a port in 1972, according to the city government and Baidu Baike.
这座港口因战争而生。据防城港市人民政府和百度百科介绍,一九六八年三月中央批准防城港作为援越抗美海上隐蔽运输航线的主要港口,防城镇的战备码头一九七二年开港。
Half a century later the quay built for secret cargoes handled 205.9 million tonnes in 2025, up 11.2 percent, and 1.3504 million containers, up 34.4 percent, according to the 2025 statistical communiqué. The ships have grown with it; by March 2025 the city counted 150 working berths, seven of them for 200,000-tonne vessels, according to the Cyberspace Administration of China.
半个世纪后,这座为秘密货物而建的码头,二零二五年完成货物吞吐量二亿零五百九十万吨,增长百分之十一点二,集装箱吞吐量一百三十五万零四百标准箱,增长百分之三十四点四,数据来自二零二五年统计公报。船也越来越大;据国家网信办介绍,截至二零二五年三月,全市共有生产性泊位一百五十个,其中二十万吨级泊位七个。
Berth 401 at Yuwan can take bulk carriers of 250,000 tonnes, according to the same source. On 2 April 2025 the Zhonghua Weiye docked at Chisha berth 2 with 204,800 tonnes of imported bauxite, opening what Xinhua called Guangxi’s largest automated dry-bulk berths.
据同一来源介绍,渔澫港区401号泊位最大可靠泊二十五万吨级散货船。二零二五年四月二日,载着二十点四八万吨进口铝土矿的”中华伟业”轮靠泊赤沙作业区2号泊位,据新华网报道,这是广西最大的自动化干散货泊位。
Metal ore, coal and steel topped the 2023 cargo list at 75.19 million, 41.26 million and 21.81 million tonnes, and the Yuwan port area took 68.2 percent of everything the city handled, according to the 2023 communiqué. Imports of ¥112.0 billion outweighed exports of ¥49.8 billion by more than two to one, while foreign trade as a whole rose 26.5 percent to ¥161.81 billion, according to the 2025 communiqué.
据二零二三年统计公报,当年吞吐量前三的货种是金属矿石、煤炭和钢铁,分别为七千五百一十九万吨、四千一百二十六万吨和二千一百八十一万吨,渔澫港区占全市港口吞吐量的百分之六十八点二。据二零二五年统计公报,进口一千一百二十亿元,是出口四百九十八亿元的两倍多,外贸进出口总额增长百分之二十六点五,达一千六百一十八点一亿元。
GDP reached ¥120.13 billion in 2025, up 6.3 percent, and the secondary sector made up 55.3 percent of it, according to the same communiqué. The resident population was 1.0789 million, according to the same source.
据同一份统计公报,二零二五年全市生产总值一千二百零一点二六亿元,增长百分之六点三,第二产业占百分之五十五点三;常住人口一百零七点八九万人。
The 2025 communiqué’s transport tables cover rail, road and water, but not aviation. The Fangchenggang–Dongxing line, opened on 27 December 2023, was the country’s first high-speed railway into a Sino-Vietnamese border city, and its trains cover the 47 kilometres from Fangchenggang North in 19 minutes, with Nanning East 73 minutes from Dongxing, according to the Guangxi development commission.
二零二五年统计公报的交通运输数据涵盖铁路、公路和水运,未列出航空运输数据。据广西壮族自治区发展改革委介绍,防东铁路二零二三年十二月二十七日开通,是全国首条直通中越边境城市的高铁,东兴市到防城港北的四十七公里只需十九分钟,到南宁东最快七十三分钟。
Reactors and Tea Songs
反应堆与采茶调
Two hundred years before the first reactor, farmers in the hills behind the port were singing tea-picking songs on the threshing floor, and the habit became an opera, according to Baidu Baike and the city government. Fangcheng tea-picking opera has 72 distinctive tunes, was born in Maoling town and is listed as regional intangible heritage, and the district won the title “hometown of tea-picking opera” in 2014, according to Sohu and Toutiao.
据百度百科和防城港市人民政府介绍,在第一座反应堆建成两百年前,港口背后山里的农民就在禾堂上唱采茶调,后来唱成了一出戏。据搜狐和今日头条介绍,防城采茶戏有七十二条特色曲调,发源于茅岭镇,是自治区级非物质文化遗产,防城区二零一四年获”采茶戏之乡”称号。
Sixteen troupes with about 250 performers now keep it going, and the seventh “Fangchenggang Has Opera” show ran from 24 to 28 November 2025, with 100 village performances that year, according to the city government. The Jing people, whose three islands of Wanwei, Shanxin and Wutou are China’s largest Jing settlement, add their own monochord music, according to the city government and China Writers.
据防城港市人民政府介绍,如今有十六个采茶戏团队、约二百五十名演职人员,第七届”防城港有戏”会演二零二五年十一月二十四日至二十八日举行,当年下乡演出一百场。据防城港市人民政府和中国作家网介绍,京族人聚居的万尾、山心、巫头三岛是中国最大的京族聚居地,他们还有自己的独弦琴。
Then there are the reactors, on the Qisha Peninsula, in what China’s nuclear industry calls the first plant in western China and in an ethnic-minority region, according to Xinhua and Baidu Baike. Unit 1 went into commercial operation on 1 January 2016 and unit 2 on 1 October that year, and unit 3, western China’s first Hualong One, followed on 25 March 2023 and unit 4 on 25 May 2024, according to Baidu Baike.
然后是反应堆,在企沙半岛,据新华网和百度百科介绍,这是中国西部地区和少数民族地区的首座核电站。据百度百科介绍,1号机组二零一六年一月一日投入商运,2号机组同年十月一日投运,3号机组即西部首台”华龙一号”二零二三年三月二十五日投运,4号机组二零二四年五月二十五日投运。
By the end of March 2025 the four units had produced more than 160 billion kilowatt-hours, according to Xinhua. The State Council approved units 5 and 6 in April 2025, each of 1.208 million kilowatts, and construction began on 23 May 2025, according to Baidu Baike and Xinhua; six units are planned in all.
据新华网介绍,截至二零二五年三月底,四台机组累计发电量超过一千六百亿千瓦时。据百度百科和新华网介绍,5、6号机组二零二五年四月获国务院核准,单机容量一百二十点八万千瓦,五月二十三日全面开工;整个项目规划建设六台机组。
One Step Abroad
一步出国
The frontier begins at the mouth of the Beilun River, where Dongxing stands at the meeting point of China’s roughly 22,000 kilometres of land border and 18,000 kilometres of coast, according to Toutiao. The Beilun is 109 kilometres long, and its lower 60 kilometres form the border, according to the same source.
据今日头条介绍,国境线从北仑河口开始,东兴正好位于中国约两万二千公里陆地边界和一万八千公里大陆海岸线的交会处。据同一来源介绍,北仑河全长一百零九公里,下游六十公里构成国界。
The Friendship Bridge across it is 111 metres long, with a painted management line and a zebra crossing in the middle, so that “stepping across means leaving the country”, according to Baidu Baike. Dongxing’s port stands 100 metres from Mong Cai, opened in 1958, closed in 1978 and reopened in 1994, and had checked more than 5.08 million entries and exits by 20 December 2023, according to Baidu Baike and the Guangxi development commission.
据百度百科介绍,横跨其上的中越友谊大桥长一百一十一米,桥中间画着分管线和斑马线,”跨一步而出国”。据百度百科和广西发展改革委介绍,东兴口岸距越南芒街口岸仅一百米,一九五八年建立,一九七八年关闭,一九九四年重新开放,截至二零二三年十二月二十日已查验出入境人员五百零八万多人次。
The land border of Fangchenggang is 101 kilometres long, and the city calls itself the only Chinese city linked to ASEAN by sea, land and river, according to the city government. It guards that line with what Xinhua calls a “five-in-one” effort by party, government, army, police and people, built on six verbs, “strike, prevent, manage, control, govern and enrich”.
据防城港市人民政府介绍,防城港陆地边境线长一百零一公里,是中国唯一与东盟海、陆、河相连的城市。据新华网介绍,当地用党政军警民”五位一体”合力强边固防,并以”打、防、管、控、治、兴”六个字落实。
Much of that effort is done on foot. In Naliang town in Fangcheng District, where 17 kilometres of border run beside a river, police officer Liang Jianhua and his colleagues from the Chaguanpo police post walk 5 kilometres of narrow mountain track every day, wading streams, with a police dog called Hani sniffing the undergrowth, according to Xinhua and Sina Finance.
很多工作靠双脚完成。据新华网和新浪财经报道,在防城区那良镇,十七公里边境线紧挨着一条河,滩散边境派出所吒管坡警务室民警梁建华和战友每天在狭窄的山路上徒步五公里,蹚水过河,警犬”哈尼”在林间嗅探。
Ordinary people help. The “Border Knights”, a cycling volunteer team that grew from around 100 riders to more than 470 in eight years, have passed on 1,200 tips, helped solve over 60 cases, helped catch 64 suspects and flagged 120 disputes before they escalated, according to Sina Finance. A community watch called the “Beilun River Guardians”, founded in 2018, once alerted officers who then caught four foreigners who had crossed illegally at night, according to China Peace.
普通人也出力。据新浪财经报道,”边境骑士队”八年间从一百来名骑手扩充到四百七十多名,累计反馈信息一千二百多条,协助破案六十余起,协助抓获犯罪嫌疑人六十四名,预警矛盾纠纷一百二十多起。据中国长安网报道,二零一八年成立的”北仑河卫士”群防队伍,曾提供线索,让民警抓获四名夜间非法入境的外籍人员。
Border small-scale trade was worth ¥14.22 billion in 2025, down 20.9 percent, according to the communiqué.
据统计公报,二零二五年边境小额贸易额一百四十二点二一亿元,下降百分之二十点九。
According to Baidu Baike, a stone marker put up under the Qing stands at Dongxing, 1.7 metres high and 0.4 metres thick, erected by the magistrate of Qinzhou as No. 5 of 33 border steles; one face reads “Great Qing, Qinzhou boundary” and the other “Great Viet”.
据百度百科介绍,东兴立着一块清代的界碑,高一点七米、厚零点四米,是钦州知州所立,为三十三块界碑中的第五号,一面刻”大清国钦州界”,另一面刻”大越”。
