Tourists flocked to the Dounan Flower Market in southwest China's Yunnan Province during the National Day Holiday which kicked off on Tuesday.
The Dounan Flower Market is the largest fresh-cut flower market in Asia and the second largest worldwide. It sells over 1,600 varieties of fresh-cut flowers under 117 categories.
Wearing flower crowns and holding bunches of flowers, tens of thousands of tourists across the country are wandering in this colorful market to pick the flowers they like.
"It's the first time for me to see such a large flower market. It's so magnificent!" said a tourist surnamed Liu from Shanghai.
The number of people visiting flower market on the first day of the seven-day holiday has climbed to nearly 500,000, driving up sales of flowers.
"The number of visitors come to my stall has soared since the beginning of the National Day Holiday as the sales jump," said Jin Taiyu, a seller at the flower market.
Sales of the stall would usually triple to about 20,000 yuan (around 2,837.04 U.S. dollars) per day during the holidays like the National Day Holiday, Jin said.
Flower companies in Yunnan are taking this opportunity by designing new flower-related products to captivate more customers.
In a flower company in Yunnan, employees are arranging special flower bouquets, which are smaller than the usual ones to ensure customers can carry them more easily.
Other flower-related products including preserved fresh flowers, known for their longevity compared to fresh blooms, are accessible for tourists visiting famous tourist destinations in Yunnan, so that they can buy them as souvenirs.
Flower market in China’s Yunnan sees booming business during National Day Holiday
Zhao Leji, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), held talks with speaker of the Finnish parliament Jussi Halla-aho in Beijing on Monday, to discuss relations between their two countries.
Noting this year marks the 75th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Finland, Zhao said China stands ready to work together with Finland to deliver on the important consensus reached between the top leaders of the two countries, and promote continuous development of the China-Finland future-oriented new-type cooperative partnership.
China is further deepening reform comprehensively and expanding high-standard opening up, which will bring new opportunities for bilateral cooperation, Zhao said, noting China is willing to make joint efforts with Finland to expand win-win cooperation and cement public support for bilateral relations.
China hopes that Finland will continue to play a positive role in boosting mutual promotion and common development of China-Finland relations and of relations between China and the European Union (EU), Zhao said.
Zhao said that the NPC is ready to carry forward the traditional friendship and implement close exchange and cooperation with the Finnish parliament.
As China and Finland each have their own characteristics in national governance and development concepts, the national legislatures of the two countries can learn from each other and play their legislative and supervisory roles to create a sound and stable legal environment for practical cooperation between the two countries, he said.
For his part, Halla-aho said that Finland stays committed to the one-China policy, noting the government of the People's Republic of China is the sole legal government representing the whole of China.
On the basis of mutual respect and trust, Finland is willing to promote practical bilateral cooperation, safeguard free trade and tackle common challenges, said Halla-aho, noting that the Finnish parliament hopes for enhanced exchange with China's NPC, so as to play a positive role in deepening the relations between Finland and China.
China's top legislator holds talks with Finland's parliament speaker on relations
