Source: China Daily

12-08-2008 16:24

The biannual China Import and Export Fair has long been an event no trader can afford to ignore.

The Canton Fair, as it's known, has been held every spring and autumn since 1957 in the southern city of Guangzhou.

It has become the bellwether of the nation's foreign trade climate. Orders placed at the two-week events usually amount to a quarter of the country's total annual export. Last April, for instance, over 192,000 buyers attended the fair's 103rd session. They made total purchases of more than $38.2 billion.

Huang, a trader who attended the fair in its early days, recalls feeling "honored" to be part of it. She remembers attendants were on hand to help exhibitors style their hair, iron clothes, and even clip fingernails.

In the early days, over 80 percent of China's foreign trade deals were done with socialist countries led by the Soviet Union. But in the 1950s, Guangzhou was already the venue for entrepreneurs from Hong Kong, Macao and Southeast Asian countries looking to do business with the mainland.