noodles

Instant noodle industry has played an important role in China's economies in the past few years, as it consumes 1/10 wheat produced in China each year. China has become the largest producer of instant noodles with annual production capacity of 40 billion packages, which account for about 50％ of the total output worldwide. Also the Chinese people consume 1/3 of the 80 billion packages of instant noodles of the world. China ranked the fourth in per capita consumption of instant noodles (34 packages) in the world in 2005, following South Korea (80 packages), Indonesia (52 packages) and Japan (50 packages). Instant noodle manufacturers have attached more importance to high-end products since prices of raw materials have increased sharply since 2003 and they have to pay more to distribution channels. Sales terminals in cities and rural markets have become the new battlefields for noodle makers. Instant noodle market tends to saturation in China after about ten years' rapid development and fried noodles are still the main stream products in the markets.