China’s Formerly Intranet-Only Xinjiang Breaks 2 Million Broadband Users, 70% Coverage

China News Service announced yesterday that Xinjiang, China’s massive western province, has reached 2 million broadband users, and 70 percent broadband coverage across the regions administrative villages. Broadband users in the province have doubled since 2009, when Xinjiang broke the one-million-users barrier.

The restive province is known as one of China’s less developed areas, and indeed, the 2 million user number belies Xinjiang’s below-average broadband penetration rate. With around 158 million broadband users, China’s broadband penetration rate is nearly 12 percent, while Xinjiang’s is just above 9 percent.

Of course, Xinjiang’s internet took a hit in 2009 when, following a series of violent ethnic riots, the government shut off all internet and telecommunications services in the region. For a significant period afterwards, Xinjiang users could access only an “intranet” of sorts that gave them access to a few provincial portal sites and services, but not much else. This almost certainly stymied the speed of broadband growth in Xinjiang, though the province certainly seems to be on the road to recovery at this point.

In fact, Xinjiang is ninth on China’s overall internet use list (remember that not everyone uses broadband to connect) with a penetration rate of forty percent. That also makes it the most internet-friendly province in China’s western region.

[Via Sina Tech]