AP Photo

BEIJING -- As the global financial crisis hit China over a year ago, shuttering shops and slashing exports, migrant worker Huang Mao left his electronics factory job in Shanghai.

Returning to his village of Tian Ping in a remote corner of south-western Yunnan province, he bought a pick-up truck with 50,000 yuan borrowed from relatives and started a new job at home: Hauling coal and construction materials such as sand.