Industry Geography of Chinese Suppliers [Area List]

How to identify if a supplier is a real factory or a trading company? One of the pieces of advice that experts give to importers is to correlate the supplier’s location with the industry geography in China. This is an easy way to estimate whether this is a trading company or a real factory, which would normally be situated in an area typical for this particular industry.

As in the rest of the world, factories in China tend to be situated in regions where there is an available resource base, good markets, an easy and affordable transport system, cheap energy, and a not-too-expensive labor force. Main factories in China for consumer products are based in the provinces of Fujian, Guangdong, Zhejiang, Hebei, Liaoning, Heilongjiang, and Anhui.

Today, western and central parts of China are still inferior to the development level of the modern districts of south and eastern parts, most of which are Coastal China provinces.

China's Major Industrial Regions and Suppliers

Northern Zone of China

The northern zone of China primarily contains the cities of state subordination - Beijing, Tianjin, Shandong, Hebei.

In Beijing, there is a high development of the electronic computer industry and pharmaceuticals.

Leading industries in Tianjin are the automotive and mechanical equipment industry; microelectronics and communications equipment; the marine chemical and petrochemical industry; and steel products. Tianjin is one of the largest ports in China, with the largest container terminal.

Shandong is often characterized as an energy base of the country, as well as an important point of transcontinental bridge from Asia to Europe.

Hebei is one of the centers for textiles and light industry, pharmaceuticals, and electronics.

Based in the eastern part of China, Shanghai city is its economic and commercial center. The leading industries include machinery, communications equipment, chemical and metallurgical industries.

The province Jiangsu is famous for mechanical, electronic, and petrochemical industries as well as automobiles. Zhangjiang is well-known for textiles, clothing and footwear, electronics, pharmaceuticals and many other industries.

Southern Zone of China

Southern Zone of China includes Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, and others.

Guangdong is famous for many kinds of production and is one of the most highly developed zones of China. Among the industries are household appliances, plastic products, clothing, textiles, and electronics.

Fujian has a similar production base, which is also supplemented by petrochemicals, engineering, construction, and building materials industries.

North-East China Zone

North-East China Zone comprises Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces.

Liaoning is one of the developed industrial centers of the country. Currently, the main sectors of the economy here are petrochemicals, metallurgy, mechanical engineering, and information technologies.

In Jilin, there are enterprises operating in automotive, petrochemical industries, as well as food, pharmaceutical and electronics industries.

The industrial complex of Heilongjiang province covers automotive, chemical, electronics, food and pharmaceutical industries.

North-West Area

North-West area of China includes in its membership Gansu, Shaanxi, and others.

Shaanxi is a big industrial center with developed industries of electronics and pharmaceuticals.

The basis of the industrial complex in Gansu is non-ferrous metallurgy, power, petrochemicals, machinery, and building materials manufacturing.

Central Area

Hebei and Hunan are provinces of the Central China area.

Hebei is one of the centers of Chinese chemical, metallurgy, construction, engineering, and food industries.

Metallurgy, machinery, electronics, food, and energy industries, and construction materials are the main production areas of Hunan.

South-West Zone

South-West Zone of China includes Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, Chongqing, and others.

The industrial structure of Guizhou contains China's largest aluminum processing plants; the electronic industry, instrument, tobacco, and distillery industries are also well developed.

The main directions of Sichuan are telecommunications, hydropower, engineering, metallurgy, and medical and pharmaceutical industries.

Pharmaceuticals is the main production category of Chongqing; more than half of enterprises in the city are engaged in this industry.

List of Manufacturing Distribution in Different Regions of China

As one can see, China covers a great deal of industry directions, thus attracting millions of buyers from the rest of the world to its numerous fairs, including specialized ones where you can find exhibitors from the product industry you have interest in. 

Finding the most appropriate industrial region for your needs means you can get reliable manufacturers, competitive prices, and fast shipping.

V-Trust has 20 years of experience in quality control and factory audit services in China and Asia. If you want to know more about China's industrial areas or need help finding reliable suppliers in China, please feel free to contact us.