URUMQI, Jan. 5 (Xinhua) -- Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region will allocate at least 450 billion yuan (nearly 70 billion U.S. dollars) for infrastructure construction this year, its planning body said.

The investment will flow to major infrastructure projects including expansion of the Urumqi airport and construction of the region's highway and railway systems.

It will also be poured into construction of the water conservation and management infrastructure and extending the region's power transmission lines.

In 2017, Xinjiang also invested about 450 billion yuan for infrastructure construction, an increase of 50 percent year on year.