HARBIN, Feb. 15 -- Chinese Premier Li Qiang on Saturday stressed stepping up the development of winter sports and related industries to create new opportunities for service consumption and a new growth driver for the economy.

Li, also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, made the remarks during his inspection tour to northeast China's Heilongjiang Province.

He highlighted the need to utilize distinctive advantageous resources, enrich the supply of quality products, stimulate the vitality of the winter economy, and continuously improve the well-being of the people.

While visiting the Harbin Songhua River Ice and Snow Carnival, Li said it was necessary to further tap into local resources to build snow and ice venues accessible to the public and create more engaging and entertaining winter activities.

He urged the province to continue to develop new consumption scenarios and new forms of business, expand and improve service consumption, and leverage its distinctive advantages to strengthen development.

The premier then visited a local ice sports center. Noting that the recently concluded 9th Asian Winter Games has further fueled public enthusiasm for winter sports, he called for efforts to leverage this opportunity to further promote mass participation in winter activities and develop industries related to winter sports equipment.

While talking with designers at a local company engaged in culture and tourism, Li said more work should be done to continuously increase the appeal of ice and snow cultural products, reinforce the principal role of enterprises in innovation to create more products and services, and strengthen international exchanges and cooperation in the sector.