Canton Fair not all gloom and doom

His factory has been robbed, he cannot move around in public without armed guards, and the business climate couldn't be more alien. Yet, Zheng Yongjiang believes that moving some of his production lines to Angola is one of the smartest things he ever did.

Standing at his booth in the Canton Fair complex, Zheng's face lights up as he greets clients from Angola who have come to renew contracts.

"German clients accounted for half of my total sales last year but they are down to 15 per cent now as they have significantly scaled back orders," he says. Buyers from Angola, Congo and Nigeria, on the other hand, now take in half of what he produces. Africa is what powers Zheng's generator business.

The biennial fair held in Guangzhou is one of the largest trade shows in the world and an important event in the global trade calendar as it brings together Chinese manufacturers such as Zheng and business people from all over the world. And that is the reason why it is often treated as the weather vane of the global economy. The reading this year is a perceptible cold drift from the West, as recovery continues to be stubbornly slow in advanced economies.

"Generator sales say much about an economy as you sell more where electricity supply is lacking," Zheng says. No wonder his generators are a sell-out in Africa.

Zheng began to explore the African market in 2008, when the first wave of economic crisis hit the United States. His vision and long-term planning back then has saved him from the spiralling economic downturn in Europe that eventually took down many of his peers who relied solely on that continent.