Green, sleepy and longing for the city

Away from the hectic dealings of Yiwu's urban markets, Satarupa Bhattacharjya comes across a contrasting picture in its villages

Yiwu is among the nearly 1,500 counties on the Chinese mainland, and given that the city feeds much of global demand for items of daily use, it may be one of the busiest counties in the world.

Famous with in China and abroad, it is apart of the larger and relatively unknown Jinhua prefecture in eastern Zhejiang province, an administrative fact few visitors care about. Yiwu is classed as a tier-three city by Chinese standard, but with its vast swathes of wholesale outlets it is urbanizing at a steady pace.