Some 150 Chinese businessmen were briefed on the investment opportunities in The Bahamas on Monday, 23 October, 2006, when Head of the Bahamas Embassy in Beijing, Philip Miller, addressed the 2006 International Market Seminar in Yiwu, Zhejiang Province.

Mr. Miller was invited to Yiwu, in the heart of the industrial and manufacturing belt of China, by the Mayor of the city, to participate in the opening ceremonies of the 2006 China Yiwu International Commodities Fair, which is one of the top three trade fairs in China.

Yiwu is renown world-wide for the manufacture and export of small, daily-use commodities such as toiletries, clothing, jewellery, toys, electronics and stationary.

In his half-hour address, the Bahamas Head of Mission highlighted the key elements of the conducive investment environment in The Bahamas, including tax exemptions.

He also focused on the deep-sea trans-shipment port in Grand Bahama and outlined the vast potential for Chinese investment in tourism and light manufacturing.

Several days before visiting Yiwu, the Head of Mission toured the exhibition grounds of the 100th Session of the Guangzhou Trade Fair in Guangdong, where he met several Bahamian businessmen and exchanged views on facilitating the efforts of Bahamian entrepreneurs in China.

While many Bahamians attend the two sessions of the Guangzhou Fair each year, one in Spring and the other in the Fall, very few Bahamans seem to be aware of the Yiwu exposition.

One of the disadvantages of the Guangzhou Fair is that buyers are usually required to order in bulk of no less than a 20-foot container. This can be onerous for small businessmen who have neither the operating capital nor the sales turnover to afford purchasing volumes at this level.

The Yiwu Fair, on the other hand, caters specifically to small business people world-wide and exhibitors are prepared to entertain purchase orders of any size, package them and ship them to retailers overseas.

The Yiwu Fair is therefore more convenient for the large number of Bahamian buyers visiting China in search of competitive prices and comparable quality.

Yiwu itself is an international marketplace for small commodities, in that, when the fair closes after a week, there is still the year-round operation of small commodities markets offering a wide range of consumer items. In fact, these markets are larger than all of the short-run fairs and yet offer the same advantages.

During his visit, Mr. Miller met not only with the Mayor, Vice Mayor and other city government officials but also with the Deputy General Manager of the largest of the year-round commodity markets in the city. Shown above is Mr. Miller and Mayor, Wu Weirong.