Animal traders who have lost their livelihoods plead for more time to wind up their affairs and recoup investments
Some 800 traders have made their homes in Xinyuan market in Guangzhou over the years, along with the wild animals they sell.
But the Sars outbreak has put a stop to their lucrative business, even though none of the traders has fallen victim to the virus.
Their trade, which includes masked civets, pangolins, monkeys, snakes and pheasants, is so profitable that many traders - half of them peasants and the other half laid-off workers - have vans to transport their merchandise.
But a week ago, the city government withdrew all licences for trading in wild animals after scientists in Shenzhen and Hong Kong discovered a strain of the coronavirus that genetically resembles the Sars virus in six masked civets.
Earlier, bad publicity about the market because of the link between animals and Sars had deterred customers from eating exotic food or even stepping foot in the dingy market.
