Entire swaths of Eastern China have halted production, prompting some companies to move entire supply chains to countries like India and Bangladesh to meet their orders.

In the past year, China's Ministry of Environment has sent inspectors to 30 provinces, where they've reprimanded, fined, or charged officials in more than 80,000 factories with criminal offenses. 'They're instituting daily fines, and sometimes - in the real severe cases - criminal enforcement.

'So, basically, you're seeing these inspectors go into factories for surprise inspections,' says Gary Huang, founder of 80/20 Sourcing, which connects foreign clients with China's supply chain. After decades of doing little about the pollution that has plagued much of the country, China's government may be finally getting serious about enforcing its environmental laws. This is happening across the country: Entire industrial regions of China are being temporarily shut down, and the unusual sight of blue skies is reappearing as environmental inspectors go about their work. All the factories out here had this issue.' 'We couldn't make the delivery date since we shut down. 'It had a big impact on our business,' he says. The boss of this factory, who asked that his name not be used for fear of punishment by local officials, says he's never seen anything like it. Inspection crews from the environmental bureau had shut businesses down, cutting electricity and gas so that they could determine who was following China's environmental laws and who wasn't. Two months ago, this factory - and this entire city, located in China's eastern province of Zhejiang - was a much quieter place. In the gritty industrial town of Yiwu, workers prepare jeans to be dyed in a vivid range of colors. A woman wearing a face mask walks on a street as Beijing is hit by polluted air and sandstorms on May 4.

Shut in 2017