Green toilets revive machine producer

KUNMING - In an old industrial factory with broken windows and doors, Geng Jiasheng and his colleagues are producing mobile, eco-friendly toilets.

Geng, 55, is a lathe operator at Yunnan Metallurgical Kunming Heavy Industry Co Ltd, which has been manufacturing casting machines, cranes and other heavy equipment for mining, metallurgy, and road construction since 1958.

The company, located in Kunming, the capital of Southwest China's Yunnan province, however, ran into trouble over the past several years because sales of heavy mechanical products plummeted, leaving several workshops idle.