Why China's Cities Need Wet Markets

[Randy W]

from the Sixth Tone

 

Why China’s Cities Need Wet Markets

They might make a convenient scapegoat, but wet markets are one of the pillars of Chinese urbanization.

 

 

Indeed, compared with modern urban supermarkets, markets like Xinfadi, which are usually located on the outskirts of cities, seem like relics of a more disorderly, bygone world. But a closer look reveals a more complex picture: These “dirty” and “messy” places have formed an inseparable relationship with urban China and continue to play an indispensable role in the journey of food from the country’s rural fields to its urban tables.

 

Prior to the 1980s, there was relatively little migration in China, and urban areas grew slowly. The agricultural products available in cities were mainly shipped in from the nearby countryside. As “reform and opening-up” gained traction, rural Chinese migrated to the cities in larger numbers — and evermore farmland was sacrificed to make way for urban construction — cities became increasingly concerned with ensuring their food security.

Technological advancements helped, allowing for the circulation of agricultural products across multiple regions. These strides combined with the widespread adoption of greenhouse technology in the 1990s to revolutionize the conditions and rhythms of vegetable farming. Large production bases emerged, including Shandong Shouguang, which this month shipped 5,000 tons of vegetables over 500 kilometers to Beijing to stabilize local prices after the latest outbreak.

Meanwhile, the adoption of refrigeration technology further diversified the types of agricultural products available in urban markets. City dwellers in China’s chilly north can now buy fresh vegetables from tropical Hainan province even in the dead of winter.