China Center in Kouvola opens today

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The China Center in Kouvola, representing some 150 Chinese companies, is opening today amidst frantic last-minute installation work and empty cardboard boxes. Many stores are still unoccupied, as some of the merchandise has not arrived in Finland as yet.
     
"Many traders are on their way to Finland, while some goods are still in transit on the high seas. We simply have not had enough time", says director Siqi Wang, having to break off to answer his phone every few minutes.
      Kouvola’s China Center is to house a total of 150 Chinese companies. Today, only some 30 of them are ready to open, while the others will be completed gradually this year and in 2008.
      The open stores will be selling clothes, food, and furnishing items.
      A Kouvola resident Sirkka Taipale has visited some of the open stores with her guests and is clearly enthusiastic about the cheap prices, hoping that the new China Center would entice more visitors into Kouvola.
     
Shopkeeper Jia Yuelan, who deals in clothes, moved to Finland from Italy, where he ran a clothing store for ten years.
      "The number of competitors is smaller in the Nordic countries", he replies when asked why he wanted to move to Finland.
      Sirkku Seila, the CEO of Kouvola's Yritysmagneetti unit, charged with developing enterprises in the town, has even more ambitious development plans for the new China Center.
     
"The supply of goods will be expanded to include even technological products, furniture, and building accessories. The aim is to establish also a showroom in which the manufacturers of plant machinery could demonstrate their products. Then the potential customers would not have to travel to China in order to have a look at the merchandise”, Seila envisages.
      According to Kouvola Mayor Aimo Ahti, the China Center will bring more jobs, competitiveness, and well-being to Kouvola. Those who have taken a negative stand with regard to the new shopping centre fear that it will also bring problems.
     
The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) has examined the problems relating to the granting of Schengen area visas to those traders who have been invited to Kouvola’s China Center.
      According to Detective Superintendent Jaakko Sonck, part of those who had been granted a visa for a visit to Kouvola have either not arrived in Finland at all or alternatively have not left the Schengen area after their arrival in Finland - at least not over the Finnish border. However, no Finnish citizens are being suspected of any wrongdoing relating to these cases.
      The owners of Kouvola’s China Center are Jiazhu Wang, a Chinese businessman, and his company Nordic Finland Investment Oy.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Chinatown rises in Kouvola (30.5.2006)

Helsingin Sanomat