Market behind Chongqing Noodles to Exceed 100 Billion Yuan

Chongqing- As the city's name card, Chongqing noodles present a large consumption market with incalculable value. 

Most people in Southwest China's Chongqing start their day with a bowl of spicy noodles, one of the typical yet popular local food items. Chongqing noodles, called XiaoMian in Chinese, with spicy and numbing flavors and are famous throughout the country.

There are more than 300,000 Chongqing noodle stores in China, including 84,000 ones in Chongqing alone. In the market of Chongqing, the average daily sales are 12.8 million bowls, with an annual output value exceeding 40 billion yuan and employing about 500,000 Chinese workers.

Data shows that for every 100 million yuan of noodles sold, 400 tons of pepper, 50 tons of Chinese prickly ash, 1800 tons of canola oil, and 50 tons of pickles are also sold. 

Experts said that Chongqing noodles are one of the unique urban cultural symbols of the city. Exploring its historical and cultural values can enhance the emotional connection and value recognition between citizens, foreign tourists, and the food. 

The market behind Chongqing noodles to exceed 100 billion yuan

Data shows that Chongqing's flour processing enterprises have covered more than 300 cities nationwide, with an annual output value of 100 billion yuan. With its great potential market, Chongqing noodles' industrial chain is still expanding. 

For example, in Zhongxian County, Chongqing Jinshahe Noodle Industry Co., Ltd. has arranged a large project to process one million tons of wheat, producing 350,000 tons of dry noodles and 350,000 tons of drinking water annually. Markets of ingredients like Fuling pickles, Shizhu peppers, and other characteristic agricultural goods are also expanded thanks to the Chongqing noodles.

Taking Yunyang noodles as the representative, Chongqing noodles has opened up a new path of noodle processing. In recent years, Yunyang noodles have formed a nationally influential gold-lettered signboard with 230,000 employees and 56,000 flour processing enterprises. Its annual output value reached over 60 billion yuan, and its labor income achieved about 20 billion yuan. In September this year, Yunyang District signed 11 related projects for 355 million yuan in a festival. 

Chongqing noodles are not only a product of rigid demand but also have a tremendous regional intellectual property (IP). In addition to the amplification effect of the Chongqing cultural tourism market, the market behind Chongqing noodles will exceed 100 billion yuan, predicted Peng Zhongming, an official of the bureau of investment promotion and facilitation in Chongqing Dadukou District. 

Hundreds of new brands of Chongqing noodles will be incubated

This March, a plan for developing Chongqing noodles industrialization was released. The city has established the industry of Chongqing noodles to target the international consumption center and high-quality consumer goods industry development. 

For example, Chongqing Dadukou District improved its industrial production standards and built a large-scale production base. It plans to build Chongqing noodle industrial park with a planned land area of 200 mu, including the central factory, storage center, supply chain center, etc., with a plan to be completed and implemented in June of next year.

The whole industrial chain investment attraction will be carried out simultaneously, encompassing raw material supply, production, packaging, sales, distribution, and research and development (R&D) design. Chongqing noodles industrial park has gathered 30 enterprises with digital, standardized, and intelligent production. 

Peng estimated that in the next three years, hundreds of new brands of Chongqing noodles would be incubated, and three to five leading enterprises with an output value of 100 million would be cultivated, aiming to enhance the market competitiveness and influence of Chongqing noodles. 

(Tan Jingyue, as an intern, also contributed to this report.)