Chinese Economy/Development thread (updated regularly)

[huzihaidao12]

I do not understand you. China has strongly implied that its policy of staying out of the top 5 is deliberate, saying that its membership level is part of giving developing countries more influence in international institutions.

I agree, what problem? China has this view, then?

 

[Solomon2]

Yes, the current Big Five have the will (I don't think Japan was an original member) but China says it wants to stay where it is. Perhaps China prefers to wield influence among developing countries that it would have to give up as one of the Five, for if China became one of the Five it could no longer caucus with the developing countries in the IMF and World Bank to vote on executive directors. By deliberately remaining with the developing countries and posing as their champion China becomes a dominating ram in a yard full of sheep - precisely the circumstance appointive directorships are supposed to avoid.

 

[huzihaidao12]

Yes, the current Big Five have the will (I don't think Japan was an original member) but China says it wants to stay where it is. Perhaps China prefers to wield influence among developing countries that it would have to give up as one of the Five, for if China became one of the Five it could no longer caucus with the developing countries in the IMF and World Bank to vote on executive directors. By deliberately remaining with the developing countries and posing as their champion China becomes a dominating ram in a yard full of sheep - precisely the circumstance appointive directorships are supposed to avoid.

This argument is certainly not accurate, I have two facts, you can refute?

China is a developing country, our per capita GDP is still low, belong to developing countries.

China paid a lot of money. Our GDP also is the second. China's economy is to match more rights. If China have more rights as a developing country, then the IMF and World Bank are able to better reflect the world, we can do more for developing countries.

 

[Solomon2]

China is a developing country, our per capita GDP is still low, belong to developing countries...Our GDP also is the second...If China have more rights as a developing country, then the IMF and World Bank are able to better reflect the world, we can do more for developing countries.

My point is, by remaining in the developing country group China, because of its size and power, can essentially dominate them and bend "doing more for developing countries" to its own will, not theirs. Very like Imperial Japan's vision of a "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere". And every Chinese knows how that turned out.

 

[huzihaidao12]

My point is, by remaining in the developing country group China, because of its size and power, can essentially dominate them and bend "doing more for developing countries" to its own will, not theirs. Very like Imperial Japan's vision of a "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere". And every Chinese knows how that turned out.

No country is a fool, if China "dominate" in developing countries, it is because other countries can get interests, or they can choose other countries, this is combination of voluntary and interests, not forced.

 

[Martian2]

The Truth About China's GDP

Let's assume that China's National Bureau of Statistics is incapable of collecting economic data. Instead, let's focus on the standard measure of electricity consumption. Compare the amount of electricity used by the United States and China.

What does it tell you about the size of the real Chinese economy? Does anybody truly believe that China's real economy is only one-third the size of the U.S. economy (as reflected in nominal GDP measurements)?

Electricity - consumption(kWh) 2010 country ranks, By Rank

Rank.....Country.............Value (kW-hours)............Date of Info
1..........United States...3,741,485,000,000.........2009 (actual, see below)
2..........China................3,643,000,000,000.........2009 (actual, see below)
3..........European Union..2,884,000,000,000..........2007 est.
4..........Russia................1,023,000,000,000.........2007 est.
5..........Japan.................1,007,000,000,000.........2007 est.
6..........India.....................568,000,000,000.........2007 est.
7..........Germany...............547,300,000,000.........2007 est.
8..........Canada..................536,100,000,000.........2007 est.
9..........France...................447,200,000,000.........2007 est.
10........Brazil.....................404,300,000,000.........2007 est.

References:

United States: International Energy Statistics

China: China's power consumption grows 6% in 2009_English_Xinhua

 

[Brotherhood]

China, EU patent offices deepen cooperation - People's Daily Online December 08, 2010

Tian Lipu(L), director of China's State Intellectual Property Office(SIPO) and Benoit Battistelli, President of European Patent Office (EPO) sign an agreement in Vienna, capital of Austria, Dec. 7, 2010. China and European Union signed an Agreement on the exchange of priority document between SIPO and EPO, and EPO-SIPO Bilateral Co-operation Annual Work Plan 2011.(Xinhua/Xu Liang)

Senior Chinese and European patent officials on Tuesday signed in Vienna bilateral cooperation agreements, deepening ties between the two sides on intellectual property rights (IPR) protections.

These documents, including a bilateral cooperation annual work plan for 2011, were hammered out during talks between Tian Lipu, Commissioner of China's State Intellectual Property Office, and Benot Battistelli, president of the European Patent Office (EPO).

During the talks, the two sides reviewed past achievement in cooperation between the two offices and discussed detailed plans for future cooperation.

Battistelli told Xinhua after the signing ceremony that he had very fruitful talks with his Chinese counterpart.

"China is becoming a major player in IPR, and it is very largely due to the efficiency and quality of STPO," Battistelli said.

Tian for his part also expressed satisfaction in the talks, saying the two sides had reached consensus in many fields concerning IPR protections.

He particularly noted that one of the agreements was to provide Chinese patent documents to European clients and innovators through a cooperation project called Machine Translation, expanding their understanding about innovation level in China.

"Introducing modern IPR system in China had benefited transnational corporations substantially, making it possible for them to invest and establish research and development facilities in China. They had also benefited hugely from collecting copy rights fees of various kind including those of patents, trademarks, publications, softwares and films," Tian said.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of founding of SIPO and the 25th anniversary of cooperation between SIPO and EPO.

Source:Xinhua

 

[Brotherhood]

China's online consumption to exceed 2 trillion yuan in 2013 - People's Daily Online December 08, 2010

More than half of China's 1.3 billion people will go online and their enthusiasm for online shopping will create a market of more than 2 trillion yuan in 2013, according to a survey by DCCI Data Center for China Internet, a leading Internet research and data information provider.

Based on the result of its survey for the first half of 2010, it estimates that by the end of 2010, the number of Chinese netizens will have reached 469 million, which is 35 percent of the country’s total population. It is a milestone for China's Internet development as it is the first time that more than 30 percent of the population will go online.

That number will rise to 718 million, which is nearly 53 percent of the total population.

The huge netizen group will boost online consumption, which has already been growing rapidly. The online consumption was worth 473 billion yuan over the first half of the year and is expected to be close to 1.2 trillion yuan for the whole year. In 2013, the market is likely to exceed 2 trillion yuan. More than half of the online consumption will come from online shopping in 2011.

Industry insiders think that fast consumers products are dominating the online deals currently. Alipay, China’s leading online payment settlement service, has even outpaced Paypal, the world’s largest in the industry under eBay. By the end of September 2010, Alipay had more than 500 million registered clients with more than 2 billion yuan of transactions on a daily basis. Its 7 million deal volume on a daily basis far outnumbered Paypal's 3.9 million in the third quarter of the year.

By Li Jia, People’s Daily Online

 

[Brotherhood]

China to continue leading global auto market - People's Daily OnlineDecember 09, 2010

China is expected to continue its global lead in auto sales, after it exceeded the US last year. Figures from the China Passenger Car Association shows domestic passenger car sales jumped to a record high in November, climbing 27 percent from a year ago. The most popular types are sports utility vehicles and multi-purpose vehicles.

Shanghai General Motors and Shanghai Volkswagen are expected to sell the most cars in China this year. Both of them have seen their monthly sales exceeded 100 thousand units in November.

Source: CNTV.cn

 

[Brotherhood]

Serbia and China sign agreement to upgrade thermal plant - People's Daily OnlineDecember 09, 2010

As part of a 1.25-billion-dollar agreement, Serbian and Chinese officials signed a 344-million- dollar contract for the first phase of work to upgrade the outdated Kostolac thermal generating plant, on Wednesday in Belgrade.

Dragomir Markovic, general director of the Electrical Power Company of Serbia (EPS), Dragan Jovanovic, director of the Kostolac thermal generating plant and Jin Chunsheng of China National Machinery and Equipment Import and Export Corporation ( CMEC) signed the agreement at a ceremony before the Serbian Minister of Mining and Energy Petar Skundric and the Chinese ambassador Wei Jinghua.

The Kostolac B plant is located east of the capital Belgrade, near the Romanian border. The scheduled upgrades are expected to bring the plant to its full capacity of 700 megawatts, to prolong its useful life by a decade, and to bring the coal-powered thermal generating plant in line with European environmental standards, with the construction of a desulfurization facility, according to EPS director Markovic.

Markovic also told reporters that the project scope encompassed railway and port facilities on the Danube River, for the movement of limestone for the desulfurization system and transportation equipment. Approximately 220 million dollars is to be financed through China Eximbank with the remainder to be raised by EPS itself. Work is expected to begin in three months once funding comes available.

"This is a project of extreme importance for our economy," said Minister Skundric, stressing the strategic significance of Serbian and Chinese interstate cooperation.

Chinese ambassador Wei said that this agreement represented the beginning of bilateral cooperation in the energy sector and paved the way for further cooperation.

Source:Xinhua

 

[ThatDamnGood]

Hong Kong's inward DI up 14.8%
Last Updated(Beijing Time):2010-12-10 10:42

Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department Thursday announced that the stock of the city's inward direct investment (DI) in 2009 increased by 14.8 percent from a year earlier to HK$7,262.1 billion ($934 billion) at market value.

The increase was mainly attributable to a rise in market values of Hong Kong affiliates of foreign enterprises and the positive DI inflow to these Hong Kong affiliates, the department said.

Analyzed by immediate source of investment, the Chinese mainland accounted for the largest share of the total stock at the end of 2009, at 36.4 percent, reflecting the importance of investment from the Mainland in Hong Kong.

Mainland's investment in Hong Kong covered a wide range of economic activities, including investment holding, real estate, professional and business services; import/export, wholesale and retail trades; and transportation, storage, postal and courier services.

Other major immediate sources of investment included the British Virgin Islands and the Netherlands, accounting for 32.4 percent and 6.8 percent respectively of the total stock of Hong Kong's inward DI at the end of 2009.


Source:Xinhuanet

---------- Post added at 05:12 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:11 PM ----------

Property tax 'next year'
Last Updated(Beijing Time):2010-12-08 12:01

Trial operations of a property tax will be launched in Shanghai and Chongqing early next year, according to the Economic Observer, which cited unidentified "authoritative" sources.

In Chongqing, the tax will be mainly levied on high-end apartments and villas while in Shanghai only newly purchased homes will be charged and the average per capita living space will be taken into consideration, according to the newspaper report.

Meanwhile, the People's Daily published a half-page article yesterday, saying that a property tax would help curb housing prices, though its impact would be limited in the medium to long term.

Source:Shanghai Daily

 

[ThatDamnGood]

Biofuels to power the future
Last Updated(Beijing Time):2010-12-10 10:06

Biofuels to power the future

A COFCO booth demonstrates the mechanics of bioethanol manufacturing at the exhibition in Changchun, Jilin province. [Photo/China Daily]

Plan to reduce nation's growing dependence on fossil fuels

China's bioethanol production will reach 10 million tons a year by 2020, resulting in a 10 percent drop in oil imports, according to COFCO group, China's largest grain trader.

"To develop a non-fossil fuel by advanced technology within an agricultural context is an important strategy for COFCO," said Lin Hailong, assistant general manager at COFCO's research and development center.

He said the government has given major support to the biofuel industry during recent years, and the cost of making bioethanol, a major ingredient of biofuels, is falling thanks to technological development.

"Because of the government's support and the potential of the market, more players have joined the biofuel industry recently," said Michael Fredskov Christiansen, president of Novozymes (China) Investment Co Ltd.

COFCO, Novozymes and China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec) are jointly involved in a project concerning cellulosic ethanol - a biofuel produced from wood, grasses, or the non-edible parts of plants. CNOOC and DuPont are also cooperating in biofuel projects too.

With the soaring price of fossil fuels, and carbon emissions becoming a global concern, discovering a clean-energy substitute is of paramount importance worldwide.

Bioenergy is considered one of the three key alternatives to fossil fuel use, alongside wind and solar energy, because of its easy acquisition and clean emissions. Biorefining is a conversion process that produces fuel, power, heat, and value-added chemicals from biomass, the biological raw material extracted from organic sources.

According to a report on the future of biorefineries by the World Economic Forum (WEF), together with leading companies and consultancies including Novozymes and McKinsey, the conversion of biomass into fuel, energy and chemicals has the potential to generate upwards of $230 billion for the global economy by 2020.

In China alone, cellulosic ethanol fuel use will replace 31 million tons of gasoline by 2020.

The industry will bring up to 32 billion yuan ($4.8 billion) profit for China, and provide 6 million new jobs, mainly in rural areas. It will also create a 96 billion yuan market for construction projects in the value chain.

The industry will improve China's energy security, boost GDP growth, and balance development between urban and rural regions, according to the WEF report.

According to Lin, a demonstration prototype of the cellulosic ethanol project will be completed by the end of 2011. If successful, the company will begin production within two to three years and then release the final product on the market.

Christiansen said China has a huge market and business opportunities for the biofuel industry, because many provinces keep importing biofuel from Brazil year-on-year.

"China meets all the requirements for biofuel production and also has the necessary geographic resources. There is also a strong domestic demand, so it makes sense to produce the fuel here," he said.

Lin said the government will give more support financially, and by means of a regulatory and policy framework, if the industry achieves more technological breakthroughs and establishes commercial facilities.

Christiansen said his company is still working on some technological barriers and construction problems, but he is sure that the development of biofuel will have a significant effect on China's transport industry.

Source:China Daily

 

[ThatDamnGood]

China's HR industry braces for more pressure
2010-12-10 09:34

The year of 2010 has seen the rate of professional level hiring in China rapidly accelerate and those in the recruiting and HR community can now really feel the pressure to find the right candidates starting to mount, said said Robert Parkinson, managing director of RMG Business Consulting Beijing Company in an interview with China Daily website November 29.

MNC/Fortune 500 and SME led expansion held back during the economic turbulence of 2009 has resumed and the number of companies hiring in substantial volumes (more than 100 heads) has dramatically increased as companies seek to make the most of the anticipated 5-7+ years of economic buoyancy in China, according to Parkinson.

Q: So which industries are particularly active?

A: RMG Selection's clients in the luxury goods sector, for example, are hiring extremely aggressively: A well known French luxury brand has seen their factories in France stretched to capacity, largely to fulfill demand from Asia, and specifically, China. There are such high levels of disposable income, in Beijing for example (a city now with the highest number of billionaires in the world) that there is even list-price demand for display models of 'big ticket' items such as $500k+ cars. This spending has been fueled particularly after the recent changes in the regulations governing the sale and purchase of real-estate. RMG Selection has seen highly competitive hiring in the luxury goods sector both from overseas and with firms poaching talent from direct competitors and other businesses with suitably skilled talent in China. A luxury handbag maker recently hired a senior-commercial executive from a major hotel chain. This is an example of movements from one luxury

In the mid-market consumer goods segment, car makers can not keep pace with demand for new cars, with many of these firms investing heavily in further expansion. Key areas of HR growth include manufacturing-oriented hiring as well as support functions such as training and network development.

In the professional services sectors such as banking, finance, and the law many areas have seen very strong growth through 2010 too, particularly those supporting the large number of initial public offerings of Chinese companies in Hong Kong. RMG Legal, our specialist Legal recruitment division, anticipates further momentum with law firm hiring through 2011 particularly those with a strong deal-pipeline based on acquiring Partners and senior lawyers in early 2010 and a shortage of candidates with genuine international calibre legal practice experience along with a high standard of ability in English-language drafting.

As firms continue to boost investment in increased capacity and support, the pressure (particularly from the Global HQ) to see a rapid return on this investment is ever present. The competition for high quality Sales &Marketing professionals is therefore fierce in a market which is generally felt to lack sales &marketing talent and leadership.

RMG Technology, the specialist ICT recruitment division of RMG also forecasts strong growth: Beijing has traditionally been China's IT hub, however we have seen many international firms expanding R&D operations in other major East coast locations such as Shanghai and Shenzhen, as well as 'second tier' cities and special economic zones.

Source:China Daily

 

[Brotherhood]

China's industrial value added output up 13.3% in Nov. - People's Daily OnlineDecember 11, 2010

China's industrial value-added output year-on-year growth quickened to 13.3 percent in November from 13.1 percent in October, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Saturday.

The growth rate for the first 11 months was 15.8 percent year on year, down 0.3 percentage points from the January-to-October period, the NBS said.

Industrial value-added output measures the final results of industrial production, which is the value of gross industrial output minus intermediate inputs such as raw materials and labor.

Source:Xinhua

 

[Brotherhood]

China's retail sales of consumer goods up 18.7% in November - People's Daily OnlineDecember 11, 2010

China's retail sales of consumer goods grew 18.7 percent in November year on year, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Saturday.

Retail sales of consumer goods stood at 1.39 trillion yuan (208.1 billion U.S. dollars) in November and the growth rate was 0.1 percentage points higher than that in October, the NBS spokesman Sheng Laiyun said at a press conference.

Retail sales of consumer goods in the January-to-November period reached 13.92 trillion yuan, up 18.4 percent from the same period last year.

The growth rate in the January-to-November period was 0.1 percentage points higher than that in the January-to-October period.

The NBS said urban consumption hit 1.2 trillion yuan in November, up 19 percent year on year.

Rural residents spent 186.5 billion yuan on consumption goods in November, up 17 percent year on year.

In breakdown, catering sector sales rose 19.6 percent to 160.1 billion yuan in November from a year earlier, while retail sales increased 18.6 percent to 1.23 trillion yuan in November year on year.

Source:Xinhua