People from European and American enterprises in Taicang, Suzhou, Shanghai and other surrounding regions, enjoyed the opening ceremony of the Taicang Beer Festival with local residents on Sept 7, Taicang Daily reported.

A castle-like venue built for 2016 Taicang Beer Festival. [Photo/Taicang Daily]

Beer culture has always been an indispensable part of German culture. It is the 11th beer festival held in Taicang to strengthen its deep relationship with Germany, and showcase Taicang's annual development.

Foreigners enjoy German style food and beer during the festival. [Photo/Taicang Daily]

For now, Taicang is home to 250 German-based companies with total investment of 13.33 billion yuan ($2 billion), and annual total industrial output of 30 billion yuan.

This year's festival will last five days, organized by Taicang Roundtable (TRT), a professional association of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), established with mostly German investment. Sept 7 saw the opening ceremony, followed by BorgWarner Night, TRT night and Schaeffler Night during the last two days. More than 6,000 people are expected to attend the event.

After Joern Ekkehard Beissert, the deputy consul general representing Germany in Shanghai, and Wang Jianguo, acting mayor of Taicang tapped the first barrel; participants began to enjoy their night of German food and music.

Munich bands play German music for Taicang Beer Festival. [Photo/Taicang Daily]

It is also the first time that 1,000 limited edition mugs have been designed for sale as souvenirs of this year's beer festival, while traditional white mugs are still free to be taken home.