Xie Gaohua (1931-2019) [Photo/WeChat account: yiwufb]

Numerous State-run news media outlets, including China Central Television, People's Daily and Xinhua News Agency, recently published feature stories about Xie Gaohua (1931-2019), the former Party secretary of Yiwu, Zhejiang province, who played a key role in the county-level city's economic rise in the 1980s.

Xie was Party secretary of Yiwu from May 1982 to December 1984. Back then, Yiwu was a small, impoverished county with backward infrastructure.

After the third plenary session of the 11th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in 1978, China officially set its economic reform in motion. As a result, many farmers in Yiwu started selling their agricultural products at roadside stalls in the county seat, but some local officials doubted the legitimacy of such free-market behavior and later banned them, citing anti-speculation or anti-capitalism principles.

One day, a female villager Feng Aiqian, who ran a roadside grocery stall in the county seat, stopped Xie in front of the government building and questioned him about the ban. After patiently listening to her complaints in his office, he concluded the conversation by declaring: "Just continue with your roadside stall business. Tell every regulator showing up at your stall that the business has been approved by the Yiwu Party secretary!"

Xie later conducted a thorough investigation and concluded that there was no wrongdoing on the part of the villagers. During one Yiwu government conference, Xie boldly stated: "We should open the Yiwu market for small commodities. If anything goes wrong, I will personally shoulder all the blame!"

On Sept 5, 1982, the Yiwu government set up two rows of stalls made of cement boards for vendors to legitimately run their businesses. Xie even daringly put forward the "Four Permits" principle for the grocery market: villagers were permitted to set up businesses in the county seat; long-distance transported goods were permitted to be sold; openness of the market was permitted; multiple channels for competition was permitted.

The grocery market gradually evolved into the Yiwu International Trade Market, which is today the world's largest wholesale market for small commodities including accessories, zippers, socks, textiles, toys, and more. The market has established business ties with 2 million small and medium-sized companies in China as well as 233 countries and regions. The market rakes in around 500 billion yuan ($78.2 billion) in annual sales.

Recalling his tenure in Yiwu, Xie once said: "Many things related to the economic reform were quite complicated then, some of which were even beyond our comprehension. So I just made every decision on the basis of facts and the interests of ordinary people."