The 2023 World Yiwunese Conference was held at the Yiwu Xingfu Lake International Conference Center. This year’s theme was “Dynamic Yiwu, Openness, Cooperation, and a Win-Win Future.” Over 400 specialized personnel, local talents, entrepreneurs, and overseas Chinese businesspeople attended the event. They gathered in Yiwu with an influential spirit of affection, contribution, and representativeness for Yiwu’s economic and social development.

Since the Chinese economic reform of 1978, Yiwu has deepened the implementation of strategies related to building thriving businesses and developing the metropolitan infrastructure. Their efforts are centered on cultivating and developing the local market and aimed towards a distinctive regional development path.

As a commercial city with unlimited business opportunities, Yiwu has a market area of more than 6.4 million square meters, 75,000 business booths, and a range of more than 2.1 million commodities divided into 26 categories. Yiwu’s market has been praised by the United Nations, the World Bank and other authoritative organizations, and is, in fact, considered the world’s largest small commodity wholesale market.

As an open-minded city becoming increasingly integrated into the world, Yiwu has trade relations with 233 countries and regions around the planet. Every year, more than 560,000 overseas businesspeople visit Yiwu to purchase goods.

As a vibrant city hosting large-scale entrepreneurship, Yiwu is home to more than 150 exhibitions every year. The logistics network has a strong influence in more than 1,500 Chinese cities above the county level and more than 700 hub cities around the world. At the same time, Yiwu hosts a national-level economic and technological development zone, which focuses on the growth of two modern manufacturing clusters: optoelectronics and automobile manufacturing.

As a harmonious and inclusively livable city, Yiwu’s spirit includes a centenary tradition based on agricultural, laborious, upright, and inclusive values. People from different countries, regions, and even various nationalities and religions are based in Yiwu and live in harmony.

Within the agenda of the 2023 World Yiwunese Conference, three special events were organized: Global Buyer Yiwu Tour, Science and Technology Talent Forum, and High-level Talents. The conference and its complementary events are effective opportunities for Yiwu people both based at home and abroad to convey Yiwu’s business status and open attitude. They are able to present Yiwu’s open, inclusive, and cooperative environment. (By Tan Zhixiao—Yiwu Commercial Daily, translated by Marco Lovisetto, edited by Daniel Haws)