China has launched the country's first market credit index in Yiwu, the country's largest distribution center for small commodities, in the eastern province of Zhejiang.

The Yiwu Market Credit Index (YMCI), launched on Wednesday, has eight specific sub-indices: credit management, entrepreneur quality, business performance, financial credit, fair competition, commodity quality, intellectual property rights and consumer rights protection.

Jointly developed by the Zhejiang Provincial Administration for Industry and Commerce, Yiwu municipal government and China Credit Research Center with Beijing University, the YMCI is aimed at reflecting the development, changes and trends of the credit situation at the Yiwu market.

The index would be published monthly, covering 13 typical commodity categories, said Du Liqun, deputy director of the China Credit Research Center.

It took September 2007 as the base period -- the basic points of YMCI and its sub-indices are designed at 100 -- for its measurement and calculation, because according to historical data and analysis, September usually saw a stable situation in market transactions with rational credit data, Du said.

The newly-released YMCI for the September-December period stood at 101.575 points on average, indicating a good situation in terms of credit levels at the market, with business performance and consumer rights protection indices fluctuating slightly with other indices steadily rising, Du said.

"It is a significant innovation in market management for Yiwu and also a good experiment in perfecting China's market system," Du added.

He Meihua, vice mayor of Yiwu, believed the YMCI could offer an alternative to assessing the market credit situation and help enhance credit awareness among dealers.

Yiwu has more than 1,400 accessories enterprises employing almost 90,000 people. Its major products are jewellery and ties.

The accessories output of the city accounts for 80 percent of the country's market share with an annual sales value of 9 billion yuan (1.24 billion U.S. dollars).

It has trade exchanges with 200 countries and regions and about 30 billion U.S. dollars worth of goods orders each year.

The city has been designated China's first national-level shopping tourist destination by the National Tourism Administration.

The Yiwu market, with more than 50,000 stalls, reported a trade volume of 3.48 billion yuan (481.3 million U.S. dollars) last year.

In October 2006, the central government officially launched the country's first small commodities index in Yiwu, covering 23 specific sub-indices in three main categories: price indices, market prosperity indices, and single monitoring and measuring indices.

(Xinhua News Agency January 25, 2008)