There may be no place on earth that had been looking forward to summer more than Xingcheng, a laid-back seaside town dotted with the occasional high rise. Xingcheng (pronounced SHING-chung), an out-of-the-way factory town on China’s northeastern coast, claims to make a quarter of the world’s swimwear. Then, just as China started getting back to work, the epidemic became a pandemic, and the rest of the world began shutting down. Factories and workshops that reopened — masks, disinfectant and temperature checks in place — had very little to do. But that would have meant buying new material, finding new suppliers, maybe even investing in new machines.

Source: International New York Times July 17, 2020 08:48 UTC