According to a report on the People's Daily, vendors in the Maliandao tea market have seen sales almost grind to a halt with official orders banning extravagant presents for officials.
"We used to work overtime every day to weigh, pack and deliver tea before the festival, but this year, the business has never been worse," said Ye Zhen, a shop owner who sells Fujian tea, adding that high-end tea is hardly being sold at all.
But all is not lost, those canny enough to sell cheaper, more acceptable mooncakes, baijiu or tins of tea have been raking it in. Boxes of mooncakes going for 100rmb a pop have been flying off the shelves in eastern Anhui, and the falling price of crabs has meant that ordinary people can now afford what was once a luxury foodstuff.
As crab and lobster make their way onto the tables of the ordinary working folk, officials still eager or stupid enough to cement a business relationship with a CCP mandarin. Ordering via the Internet has meant that warehouses across the country are doing a brisk trade, and courier companies ferrying the 1000rmb bottle of baijius make a small fortune.
"Some people place orders on the Internet and leave the addresses of their 'friends'. So, no one would know what's in the packages or how much they are worth," said a tea shop owner, who declined to be named.
So much for going after tigers and flies. The year long corruption crackdown is only in it's infancy, but the limiting damage to the economy and cleaning up government is not going to be as easy as Xi Jin Ping might think.
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