The Northeast China Sock Industry Park in Liaoyuan, Jilin province, is the largest cotton sock production base in China after 11 years of development. About 7 million pairs of cotton socks are transported to every corner of the world from the park each day.

The industry park has its own brands, whole-industry-chain services and strong research and development capabilities.

Sun Xiaotian, who returned from Japan in 2002, set up his own business in the industry park. His company is committed to producing customized socks, such as red socks folded in rose patterns to be used in traditional Chinese wedding ceremonies, and socks packaged as Christmas and birthday gifts.

"To win out in the competition, we need to not only control costs, but more importantly increase the value of the products," Sun said.

In the early development stage, many factories in the park operated as original equipment manufacturers. There was a lack of innovation or the ability to adapt to market changes. Many of them collapsed.

The industrial park administrative committee then set up a research and development center, providing new designs and updated market information to companies.

Wang Mingna, director of the R&D center, said her team is making socks with new nanomaterials.

"The socks can even 'breathe', and are wrinkle-free."

Her team is working on more than 20 kinds of socks made in new materials. The most expensive pair costs nearly 400 yuan ($61.50).

The center is looking for all possible materials that can be used in the production of socks. The researchers often go to the United States and Japan to keep abreast with the latest market developments to understand the new trends.

With the help of e-commerce, for domestic orders of fewer than 100,000 pairs of sock, the companies ensure that their customers receive their products within seven days of receiving the orders. The whole process includes purchasing cotton, spinning, dyeing, weaving, packaging and transportation.

"All needs of the sock companies can be satisfied in an area with a diameter of several hundreds of meters in the park," said Tian Zhongjun, president of the industry park.

The central government earmarked Liaoyuan as one of the first batch of resource-depletion cities that must transform their economies in 2005, when the sock industry started taking off in the city.

Tian said a large number of related enterprises on the sock industry chain concentrate on the e-commerce platform. The internet will be an important driver to the future growth of the industry park.

(China Daily 04/27/2016 page10)