Canton isn't the only region that would work well for this, but there's so much historial merit for Canton to make enough money for someone to fuck up a warring states period that I think it's rather perfect.
Catalonia and Tours is another region I considered. I need to study into the history of that area from the Catalonian perspective, more; like, the long history there. I also considered Somalia and Somaliland, but I can't seem to work out a realistic way of doing it that doesn't involve a Chinese or American company having essentially Guatemala'd the country before the story starts, which is a different story from countless farms, co-ops, corpos, family businesses, and hats of all colours from black to white in every industry. It's the same reason why I don't do it with Central America; that, and I don't think I could do the an-com ideals that are fostered there now the justice they deserve.