Beijing to upgrade largest wholesale market

Beijing's largest wholesaler Xinfadi, located in the southern suburbs of the capital, will upgrade its service and halve the number of wholesalers in the next five years.

Xinfadi, with an annual trade volume of 14 million tonnes of meat, fruit and vegetables, has 5,000 wholesalers in a vast swathe of land outside the fourth ring road in southern Beijing.

In the next five years, the number of wholesalers will be halved to about 2,000, said Zhang Yuxi, director of the board of Xinfadi Agricultural Goods Incorporation Ltd, Tuesday.

"We will integrate some smaller wholesalers into bigger ones, and only keep the strong players in the market," he said.

Part of its storage and processing facilities will be transferred to Tianjin and Hebei province, as part of the integration plan between the cities, he said.

The area surrounding Xinfadi has been plagued by traffic congestion as lines of trucks carry goods to the capital.

"We plan to build better facilities in the market and improve its surroundings and ease traffic jam in the area," said Zhang.