The output of tomato products in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region reached 750,000 tons in 2004, accounting for 90 percent of the country's total and a quarter of the world's total, local government said Wednesday.

In 2004, the total tomato output in the region was 4.52 million tons, according to the Regional Committee of Development and Reform.

The region has become the country's largest base of tomato and tomato products and the third largest in the world, after the United States and Italy, the committee said.

Xinjiang is now capable of manufacturing 800,000 tomato products each year, the committee said.

Each year the region can produce more than 400,000 tons of ketchup and export 300,000 tons, topping all the other Chinese provinces and regions.

(Xinhua News Agency September 15, 2005)