"Land in Yiwu is so limited and expensive that we have moved our factories to the northern part of Jiangsu province, which is 10 times larger than Yiwu," says Hong of Bonas.

Jia, however, says that the government has its own concerns on land distribution. "Yiwu is a manufacturing center for many industries, and not just socks. Factories are almost everywhere in the city. Of course, we do not want our grown-up sock companies to move out, but we need time to solve this problem."