In order to develop the pandemic-stricken economy, China recovered the street vendors (商贩) in a new nation-wide method known as "street stall economy'', allowing residents to set up open-air shops on the sidewalks or other available public spaces.
Street vendors were once an important part of China's economy and urban landscape. However, since China's economy took off in the last decade, street vendors have gradually disappeared from the streets and many of them opened shops of their own.
Fast forward to today, street vendors have come into our sight again after cities such as Chengdu and Yantai succeeded in creating hundreds of thousands of jobs by giving street stalls permission to operate. China's tech industry was quick to jump on the street vendor trend, with tech giants including Alibaba, Tencent, Meituan and JD.com flocking to dish out cheap loans, offer support and payment solutions to millions of owners of newly established small businesses.
Ant Financial, Alibaba's fintech arm, promised its mobile wallet app Alipay will give interest-free loans to 30 million vendors, and 70 billion RMB of interest-free credit line to consumers to make purchases everywhere, including street vendors.
JD.com provided 50 billion RMB worth of quality goods for street vendors, and provided each one of them with a maximum 100,000 RMB interest-free loan to stock up.
Tencent's WeChat announced to offer payment solutions, marketing supports and even training for up to 50 million street vendors, with the end goal of digitally transforming them to increase their income.
Guangzhou city partnered with WeChat this month to hold a live streaming shopping festival to improve sales of local produce. In attempts to promote various live streaming platforms, many tech CEOs also made their own live streamed e-commerce debuts (首次亮相) selling goods coming from all over the country.
