The 2010 China Yiwu International Forest Product Fair will feature its first-ever Taiwan Pavilion and more than 300 Taiwanese businesses.
Ding Hongbo, marketing director for the Shanghai Taiwan Meeting Fair Association, told the Central News Agency that to attract Taiwanese firms, the Chinese Government was offering them a nearly 40 percent discount for participating in China’s largest forestry product event.
Ding said Taiwanese participants will only need to pay 1,500 to 2,000 Chinese yuan (US$220 to US$294) for a booth, compared with 2,400 to 3,000 yuan for other participants at the fair, which will be held in Yiwu, Zhejiang Province from Nov. 1 to 4 November.
“More than 300 Taiwanese businesses will attend the fair this year, nearly triple the number in 2009, ” Ding said, adding that Taiwan’s agriculture products are expected to attract a lot of attention at the event.
The Taiwan Pavilion, with more than 10,000 square meters of floor space, is expected to host vendors from sectors including bamboo and wooden crafts, furniture and commodities, flower and gardening, forest leisure and edible products from forests.
With cross-Taiwan Strait relations growing closer after the signing of the economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) , Chinese authorities would like to see more Taiwanese businesses operating in China or in Taiwan participate the event, Ding said.
“It is expected to offer a great chance for Taiwanese businesses to find sales agents in China, because Yiwu is such a big wholesale market,” Ding said.
Yiwu is known as the largest wholesale market of small commodities in the world, boasting more than 60,000 vendors. More than 300, 000 people visited the Yiwu market per day last year.
The forest product fair was launched in 2008 and hosted by China’s State Forestry Administration and the Zhejiang Province government.
