On May 13, the Wal-Mart held an agriculture and supermarket seminar in Dandong. Wal-Mart is said to start business in the city in the second half of the year. Wal-Mart has targeted the city’s quality farm produce. Once they are settled, rice and strawberries, Dandong’s proud specialties, will soon make for the country and even the world in scales through the Wal-Mart platform. This will actuate Dandong’s agricultural industrialization as a whole.

"We never expected Dandong’s farm produce to be so good. The rice and strawberries are particularly delicious. They fully qualify to be sold on the shelves of Wal-Mart," said Gao Zhanpeng, national fresh food senior project manager of Wal-Mart (China) Investment Co., Ltd., in the afternoon of May 12, when he inspected the Haitian Rice Industry Co., Ltd., under May 4th Farm and the organic strawberry fields of Yiquan Town. The manager of Haitian Rice Industry said Donggang yields exceptionally good rice, because of unique geographical position and sound environment. However, Donggang fails to receive enough orders, because of poor popularity, and this has restricted scaled development of the rice business. If Donggang could be a supplier of Wal-Mart, the city will be able to promote its rice to the nationwide market, and stimulate more farmers to realize common development.

It is an unprecedented event in the province for Wal-Mart to settle down in a third-tier city, said Liu Peng, chairman of Dandong Yilong Real Estate Development Co., Ltd.,, a cooperation partner of the Wal-Mart project. So far, the Wal-Mart project has entered the interior decoration stage. The overall project will be finished at the end of September. It is expected that during the October 1st vacation period, a new shopping center integrating a hypermarket, 3D cinema, catering and entertainment services, will greet Dandong consumers.