BEIJING: A Pakistani businessman, along with three other foreigners, was issued the first working visa valid for five years by the administration of the China’s Yiwu city in Zhejiang province.

Mohammad Arif and three nationals of Afghanistan, Jordan and Iraq were the first batch granted the First Class work permit by the Exit-Entry Administration of the Bureau of Yiwu’s Municipal Public Security Bureau under the new visa policy.

Prior to this policy, businessmen used to be issued visas only for one year.

Talking to APP, Mohammad Arif said that he and his family were settled in Yiwu and imported various goods from Pakistan.

He said the local government had promised to issue the five-year permit to 200 businessmen, and he was part of the first batch issued the permit by the Yiwu administration.

Yiwu is the world’s largest consumer goods purchasing centre having an area of 4.7 million square metres. It has 70,000 booths and sells 1.7 million goods of different kinds.

Over 400,000 overseas businessmen come to Yiwu each year, and over 13,000 overseas businessmen from more than 100 countries and regions reside in the city.

Published in Dawn, September 2nd, 2019