Yiwu is now home to 222 "Taobao villages", with 25 new ones listed in 2022, making the city home to the largest cluster of e-commerce villages in the country, according to AliResearch, a think tank owned by Alibaba Group.

A Taobao village refers to an administrative village (excluding neighborhood committees) with annual e-commerce sales of at least 10 million yuan ($1.43 million). The number of active online stores in a Taobao village should be at least 100 or account for over 10 percent of the total households.

Specifically, as of 2022, the number of Taobao villages in China increased by 11 percent year-on-year to 7,780. The villages are located in 28 provinces (autonomous regions, municipalities) and 180 cities and regions across the country. The number of Taobao towns reached 2,429, a year-on-year increase of 12 percent.

Officials said that Yiwu is the most active area for rural e-commerce operators and online stores in Zhejiang province. To date, Yiwu has built 496 rural e-commerce service stations, and all residents in the city now have access to rural e-commerce services.

From January to September this year, the city's e-commerce transaction volume increased by 7.62 percent year-on-year to 292.87 billion yuan.