SHANGHAI, Nov. 6 (Xinhua) -- Every cashmere scarf that leaves Nepalese businessman Shankar Koirala's booth at the China International Import Expo (CIIE) carries a signature. It belongs to the artisan who spent months, sometimes years, stitching the piece by hand.
The CIIE, the world's largest import-themed expo, has opened a new market for Koirala's business, linking more than 600 artisan families in Nepal with Chinese buyers thousands of kilometers away.
"When we didn't know where to promote our products, the CIIE gave us a platform," said Koirala at the ongoing ninth edition of the trade event. His company, Himalayan Threads, had little presence in China before joining the expo.
WIDE BRIDGE FOR SMALL BUSINESSES
Now on his sixth visit, Koirala has seen his booth expand from nine to 72 square meters, as his products have found a foothold in China. Growing business has also meant higher earnings for the artisans, he said.
While shouldering the bulk of economic growth and employment in most countries, micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) often struggle to tap into foreign markets due to limited visibility, constrained resources, and a lack of local market knowledge.
Connecting them with China, the world's second-largest consumer market, has therefore become an enduring feature of the CIIE. Official data show that nearly 13,000 overseas MSMEs participated in the first eight editions of the event.
While multinational giants often dominate the headlines, the expo has also become a launchpad helping smaller players gain greater visibility, build business connections and enter China's consumer market.
MISSION TO OPEN DOORS
Imagine shopping for clothes online and feeling the fabric before placing the order. At CIIE's Innovation Incubation Special Section, a four-person Dutch startup is making this future arrive sooner than it seems.
The company, HaptonTech, is developing touch-responsive screens and wearable devices using advanced liquid crystal materials.
Originally conceived to help visually impaired people interact with digital devices, its technology enables flat surfaces to change shape and produce tactile sensations, with potential applications in sectors ranging from digital interfaces to robotics and medical equipment.
For founder Mert Orhan Astam, making his CIIE debut is less about selling a product than about finding partners to commercialize the technology for the Chinese market.
"Our main objective here is to open the doors," Astam said. "More important than money, more important than sales, we want to be known, and we want people to work with us."
China, in his view, is an obvious destination. "People here are willing to try new things," he said.
The company is in talks with a Chinese robotics firm on a joint project and is seeking manufacturing and research partners to explore commercial uses of the material.
Oman's Luban Island, which sells frankincense in more than 20 countries but is still a new entrant to China, is another first-timer hoping to gain exposure.
Bringing 14 products to the CIIE, including three China debuts, the brand hopes to "catch the China express" via this expo, said Amin Asghari, head of overseas procurement.
For newcomers like these, the expo offers more than a sales channel. It provides visibility, potential partners and a first introduction to a market that would be hard to reach alone.
REWARDS BEYOND THE BOOTH
For those already on board, the ride is still picking up speed. Drawn by the sheer scale of the Chinese market, many exhibitors return year after year with larger stands and bigger orders, and find rewards reaching well beyond the booth.
Hu Tao, director of Pacific Alpacas, a New Zealand maker of alpaca quilts and apparel, first came to the CIIE in 2021 with little more than a nine-square-meter booth and around 100 quilts to test a market the company had barely explored.
Six years on, the booth has grown to 150 square meters, while the company expects its annual sales in China to exceed 30 million yuan (about 4.5 million U.S. dollars) in 2026.
But the six-day expo is only part of the story. "What matters more is the spillover effect," he said.
Through the expo, the company forged two valuable business connections: one with a textile mill in Wuxi, east China's Jiangsu Province, that helped improve the quality of its quilts, and another with a marketing agency in Shandong Province that opened the door to livestream commerce.
Shanghai is working to turn such chance encounters into year-round trading through a "six days plus 365 days" approach. As of July 2026, Hongqiao 365, a CIIE-linked trading platform, featured more than 85,000 products from over 120 countries and regions, roughly 70 percent of them previously exhibited at the expo.
Just across from the CIIE venue, the Greenland Global Commodity Trading Hub, which also helps turn exhibits into marketable products year-round, has attracted 180 companies from 76 countries and regions, brought in over 90,000 imported products, and helped more than 200 overseas brands make their China debuts or open their first stores in the country.
"Year-round platforms like this can turn short-term matchmaking at the expo into long-term trade ties and give companies room to learn what Chinese consumers want," said Shao Yu, chief economist at the Innovation Center of the School of Management, Fudan University.
GROWING WITH CHINA
For Hu, certainty is yet another reason to bet on the Chinese market. Preferential tariff terms and streamlined customs procedures have made cross-border operations more predictable. "We know that when we ship our products today, they will reach our processing factory in two months," he said.
That certainty is rippling back to New Zealand's alpaca farms. As Pacific Alpacas expands its business in China, its fiber purchases have become more consistent, giving farmers a steadier income outlook.
With such assurance, farmers can invest and expand their farms, while businesses in fiber cleaning and processing also stand to benefit, Hu said.
The certainty carries extra weight amid rising protectionism and global trade uncertainties. Smaller firms, with limited resources and less capacity to absorb shocks, are often the hardest hit, Shao said.
China's market offers a counterweight, he added. "China's huge domestic market, steady consumption upgrading and a package of policies to expand imports have opened up stable and broad room for growth for small firms worldwide."
The Export-to-China Capacity Development Report, released on Thursday at the Hongqiao International Economic Forum alongside the expo, says rising household incomes and a shift toward higher-quality goods and services leave China with considerable room to expand imports.
China's growing demand for both high-end manufactured goods and primary commodities, the report adds, makes China an inclusive market for economies at different stages of development.
The CIIE is set to remain part of this picture. In its five-year development blueprint for the 2026-2030 period, the country has called for expanding imports and continuing to hold the CIIE and other major trade fairs, while strengthening trade-promotion platforms.
Back in New Zealand, the impact is measured not in booth space or sales figures, but in something simpler: alpaca farmers who know next year's orders are coming.
