Ed Butler

Once a small rural town, Yiwu began gaining a reputation back in the 1980s for its open-air market selling small commodities.

Now it's a sprawling international trade centre, spanning hectares and several floors.

That's Han Lin, China director for the consultancy The Asia Group.

There are 50,000 shops in all.

If you were to spend just three minutes in every one of them, it would take you more than a year to get round the maze of arcades here.

Ashley Dudarenok, the founder of a Chinese research and analytics consultancy that works with companies in the city, says that Yiwu's distinctive quality is the spirit of enterprise that drives its thousands of traders.

It's one of multiple towns and cities in China built...

around a very specific category of export.

Christmas products.

How did that evolve?

Just tell me, I mean, talk to me about that.

This dates back to the 90s or something.

That's consultant Ashley Dudaranok.

I'm Ed Butler, and today I'm looking at Yiwu, the Chinese city hosting the world's largest wholesale market, which itself alone provides the world with more than half of its Christmas decor.

But how secure an industry is this, given the growing cost of all this international trade, especially the trade that's going to the US?

Ever since the start of his second term in January, President Trump has been introducing, and then sometimes walking back, massive hikes on the import taxes imposed on Chinese goods.

It's left many traders in Yiwu predictably frustrated.

Storeholders in Yiwu are no longer as reliant on the US as they once were, switching exports instead to other countries.

In America, in this sector, as with other imported goods, prices have been rising.

In the run-up to Christmas, I spoke to Mac Harmon.