Shi Xiaoping, who works at Xinxing Electrical Appliances store in the south-western Chinese farming town of Haiyuan, is surprisingly upbeat for someone whose job it is to sell washing machines and fridges to sugar cane farmers, many of whom have just lost half of their harvest in the worst floods in decades.

But Ms Shi, like hundreds of other retailers and electronics makers across China, is expecting to benefit from a government-backed project that aims to kick-start sales in rural areas of the country by offering television sets, washing machines, refrigerators and mobile phones at controlled prices with an additional 13 per cent rebate.