Dongguan, more than just 'Sex City'
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E-mail Xinhua, February 14, 2014
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| The city produces one fifth of the world's digital products. [file photo] |
Ongoing transformation
Booming manufacturing attracted millions from all over China. According to the city government, permanent residents reached 8.3 million in 2012, but only 1.87 million of them are locals with household registrations. The population density exceeded 3,300 per square kilometer, triple that of Beijing.
Since the world economic downturn in 2008 and with increasing labor costs, the "factory of world" has been forced to change its growth pattern.
The Dongguan Light Array Display Products Co. Ltd., a company which used to manufacture household appliances for foreign brands, have turned to hi-tech products such as high-end camera modules and electro-optic application products.
Shu Weiping, general manager of the company, said the company changed their target from foreign to domestic consumption with large spending on technical research and development. Sales revenue have surged from less than 10 million yuan to 40 million, and the number of employees decreased from 7,000 to less than 1,000.P Apart from manufacturing, services also face transformation, especially with the government attitude revealed through sex trade crackdown.
The number of five-star hotels in Dongguan City ranks third after Beijing and Shanghai, and there are more than 1,000 starred hotels in the city, many of which are involved with underground prostitution.
Rumors say the crackdown will affect 200,000 jobs, and even taxi drivers will lose both prostitutes and their clients as passengers. However, experts say that is groundless assumption.
"Under Chinese political and legal system, which bans prostitution, sex services will never become a real industry for any city, including Dongguan," said Lin Jiang, head of the Public Finance and Taxation Department of Lingnan College of Sun Yat-sen University.
A hotel manager who preferred not to be named told Xinhua the crackdown on prostitution is a sign for transformation of the service sector.
"Investment will flow to other, better sectors since the authorities will no longer turn a blind eye to prostitution," he said.
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