By BAI Fan, CHENG Lu
Yiwu, the largest small commodities center and source of exports in the world, is under a three-day lockdown from Thursday to Saturday. Since August 2, Yiwu has reported 581 Covid cases. Packages stopped dispatching from the town as delivery companies asked to halt operation.
On August 3 alone, more than 26 million packages were sent out from the small town in Zhejiang Province, which occupied producing flags and other merchandise for the FIFA World Cup in November. Several dealers told Jiemian News that they had been told that express deliveries would be stopped for three to five days.
Work has already stopped in many factories. “We have lost about a million yuan so far this year,” said one factory owner. “I don’t know what the lockdown means to the business, but we have to stop.”
CHEN Xianchun’s factory received orders for World Cup badges and key chains months ago. “I'm working from home now, but the factory is still operating fine as all workers are not leaving the plant,” he said, but the pandemic changed how business is done in Yiwu. Logistics is not the biggest problem. “The price of raw materials like plastics and metals are rising every day,” Chen said.
Most of Chen’s new orders originate online. No one visits his shop in Yiwu International Trade City anymore.
“Sixty percent of my orders are now from old clients,” said Chen. “New clients, I have mostly never met in person, but the volume is small.”
