East China's Shandong Province, home to more than 20,000 overseas-funded businesses, will extend the length of its expressways to 2,000 km by the year 2000 and 2, 600 km by 2002, which will take it up to nearly the level of developed countries.

By then, all the 17 cities and prefectures in the province with an area of 150,000 sq km, will be connected by highways.

As part of its effort, the province will invest more than 15 billion yuan in expressway construction this year.

The funds will mainly be used on new highway projects with a combined length of 638 km.

Shandong is the first province in the country to have a dozen expressways exceeding 1,000 km since its first such road linking the provincial capital of Jinan and the coastal city of Qingdao opened to traffic in 1993.