Aidian Port on the border between the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in south China and Vietnam has become a bustling market for trading herbal medicines.

More than 100 shops in Aidian sell medicines to Vietnamese traders with a combined daily volume ranging from 20 tons to 100 tons, said Yan Yaoxin, deputy director of Chongzuo City Bureau of Commerce.

The annual trade value in medicines on the Aidian market exceeds 200 million yuan (25 million U.S. dollars), Yan said.

Guangxi has 4,600 species of herbal medicines and produces about 70 of the 400 varieties in common use in China. Guangxi is also one of the country's four major growers of artificially-cultivated herbs.

The region exported over 35 million U.S. dollar-worth of herbal medicines to southeast Asian countries last year, a rise of 24.8 percent year on year. About 88.8 percent of exports worth 31 million U.S. dollars went to Vietnam.

Records in Vietnam show the Yellow Emperor's Canon of Medicine, an ancient Chinese medical tome, was introduced to Vietnam during the Sui (581-618) and Tang (618-907) dynasties. Chinese medicines were commonly used in Vietnam after the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279).

"People in Vietnam know their own herbal medicines as 'south medicines' and Chinese medicines as 'north medicines'," said Xie Guangming, a medicine trader from east China's Fujian Province.

Some of the Chinese medicines exported to Vietnam are re-exported to Myanmar, Laos, Thailand and other countries, Xie said.

Ten years ago, Aidian had just three narrow streets with 100 households. Now it has eight wider and longer streets, drawing traders from around China.

Aidian has been open to foreign trade for more than a century. More than 80 percent of China's herbal medicine exports to Vietnam go through the town.

Source: Xinhua