With its population of approximately 300,000 inhabitants, Białystok is very much north-eastern Poland’s largest city and the administrative, economic and educational centre of the region. Białystok is located at the hub of such important international overland routes as those running from Western to Eastern Europe, or the Berlin – Warsaw – Sankt Petersburg – Moscow railway line, along with the Via Baltica transport route that crosses the Baltic states before reaching Warsaw. This, together with Białystok’s neighbouring on Belarus, Lithuania and Russia, fosters the development of economic and cultural relations with both eastern and western European countries. Not far from the city, there are several border crossings handling freight and passenger transport alike.

Białystok has seventeen institutions of higher education that are its brains trust supporting the developing city’s economy. Here, the most important sector is industry with its dominant branches of farm and food industry, electrical and electrical machinery industry, plastics processing industry, timber industry, textile industry, general and specialized construction industry. The well developed transport, accommodation and catering infrastructure, unpolluted environment and lack of heavy industry make Białystok an attractive place to live and rest. The city boasts its leafy parks, trimmed squares and green spaces.

Within several dozens of kilometers away from Białystok are beautiful woods of the Białowieża Primeval Forest and the Europeanclass unique Biebrza and Narew National Parks. The specific cultural climate of the city is mainly due to the centuriesold multinational and multireligious tradition whose traces make for the quintessential tourist attraction Białystok undoubtedly is. Poland’s entry into the European Union has opened for the city new prospects of development.