I have noticed a lot of discussion about China in many of the threads on this site, but no single thread for China per say.
Found this article on China to be rather interesting... so rather than twisting an existing thread to an unrelated bent, I thought I would kick off a new one with this article I found in the Asia Times.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/GC19Ad05.html
A warning for those who are interested, it is a long article, however it does a interesting analysis on the relationship between China and Japan, as opposed to the usual China vs US story, as well as making some interesting geopolitical observations about the US, Japan, China relationship.
China
China
by Disco Stu » Mon Mar 21, 2005 10:29 pm
Disco Stu is leaving the building... he can sometimes be found at http://asxsharenerd.wikispaces.com/
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by adrianjt » Tue Mar 22, 2005 6:13 am
great article Disco Stu,
was sorta bored, got enthralled, my condensensed extract version follows
plus also this positive economic article for todays bears
http://www.aireview.com/index.php?act=v ... =8&id=1567
since the end of the Cold War in 1991 and particularly under the administration of George W Bush, the United States has been doing everything in its power to encourage and even accelerate Japanese rearmament
Can the United States and Japan, today's versions of rich, established powers, adjust to the re-emergence of China
The truly significant trade development of 2004 was the EU's emergence as China's biggest economic partner, suggesting the possibility of a Sino-European cooperative bloc
China's trade with Europe in 2004 was worth $177.2 billion, with the United States $169.6 billion, and with Japan $167.8 billion.
Most important, China's external debt is relatively small and easily covered by its reserves; whereas both the US and Japan are approximately $7 trillion in the red, which is worse for Japan, with less than half the US population and economic clout
Ironically, part of Japan's debt is a product of its efforts to help prop up America's global imperial stance. For example, in the period since the end of the Cold War, Japan has subsidized America's military bases in Japan to the staggering tune of approximately $70 billion. Refusing to pay for its profligate consumption patterns and military expenditures through taxes on its own citizens, the United States is financing these outlays by going into debt to Japan, China, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong and India. This situation has become increasingly unstable as the US requires capital imports of at least $2 billion per day to pay for its governmental expenditures. Any decision by East Asian central banks to move significant parts of their foreign-exchange reserves out of the US dollar and into the euro or other currencies to protect themselves from dollar depreciation would produce the mother of all financial crises.
Japan still possesses the world's largest foreign-exchange reserves, which at the end of January stood at around $841 billion. But China sits on a $609.9 billion pile of dollars (as of the end of 2004)
"We see the special relationship between the United States and Great Britain as a model for the [US-Japan] alliance."
The Bush administration is seeking, among other things, an end to Japan's ban on the export of military technology, since it wants Japanese engineers to help solve some of the technical problems of its so-far-failing Star Wars system
What Japan currently lacks are the platforms (such as submarines) for a secure retaliatory force in order to dissuade a nuclear adversary from launching a preemptive first strike. (assuming it builds nukes, has the means)
Taiwan might try to seek a status somewhat like that of French Canada - a kind of looser version of a Chinese Quebec under nominal central government control but maintaining separate institutions, laws and customs.
The mainland would be so relieved by this solution it would probably accept it, particularly if it could be achieved before the 2008 Beijing Olympics
By the summer of 2004, Bush strategists, distracted as they were by Iraq, again became alarmed over China's growing power and its potential to challenge US hegemony in East Asia.
On February 19 in Washington, it signed a new military agreement with Japan. For the first time, Japan joined the US administration in identifying security in the Taiwan Strait as a "common strategic objective". Nothing could have been more alarming to China's leaders than the revelation that Japan had decisively ended six decades of official pacifism by claiming a right to intervene in the Taiwan Strait.
t is possible that, in the years to come, Taiwan itself may recede in importance to be replaced by even more direct Sino-Japanese confrontations
nd he proposed joint Sino-Japanese exploration of possible oil resources in the offshore seas that both sides claim. All such gestures were ignored by Koizumi,
during World War II the Japanese killed approximately 23 million Chinese throughout East Asia
Matters came to a head in November at two important summit meetings: an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) gathering in Santiago, followed immediately by an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
Koizumi went out of his way to insult Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao in Vientiane. He said to Premier Wen, "It's about time for [China's] graduation"
On November 10, the Japanese navy discovered a Chinese nuclear submarine in Japanese territorial waters near Okinawa. Although the Chinese apologized and called the sub's intrusion a "mistake"
Over time this downward spiral in relations will probably prove damaging to the interests of both the United States and Japan, but particularly to those of Japan. China is unlikely to retaliate directly
Nearly 70,000 Chinese students now study at Japanese universities, compared with 65,000 at US academic institutions. These close and lucrative relations are at risk if the US and Japan pursue their militarization of the region.
French foreign-policy think-tanks have long promoted the goal of 'multipolarity' in a post-Cold War world, ie, the preference for many different, competing power centers rather than the 'unipolarity' of the US as a single hyperpower. Multipolarity is no longer simply a strategic goal. It is an emerging reality."
Ninety-eight percent of Japan's imports from Iran are oil.) On February 18, 2004, a consortium of Japanese companies and the Iranian government signed a memorandum of agreement to develop jointly Iran's Azadegan oilfield, one of the world's largest, in a project worth $2.8 billion. The US has opposed Japan's support for Iran, causing Congressman Brad Sherman (Democrat, California) to charge that Bush had been bribed into accepting the Japanese-Iranian deal by Koizumi's dispatch of 550 Japanese troops to Iraq, adding a veneer of international support for the US war there.
But the long-standing Iranian-Japanese alignment began to change in late 2004. On October 28, China's oil major, the Sinopec Group, signed an agreement with Iran worth between $70 billion and $100 billion to develop the giant Yadavaran natural-gas field. China agreed to buy 250 million tons of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Iran over 25 years. It is the largest deal Iran has signed with a foreign country since 1996 and will include several other benefits, including China's assistance in building numerous ships to deliver the LNG to Chinese ports. Iran also committed itself to exporting 150,000 barrels of crude oil per day to China for 25 years at market prices.
The US has also charged China with selling nuclear and missile technology to Iran.
The European Union is China's largest trading partner and China is the EU's second-largest trading partner (after the United States
Back in 1989, to protest the suppression of pro-democracy demonstrators in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, the EU imposed a ban on military sales to China. The only other countries so treated are true international pariahs such as Myanmar, Sudan and Zimbabwe
On a visit to Beijing in October, he said that China and France share "a common vision of the world" and that lifting the embargo will "mark a significant milestone: a moment when Europe had to make a choice between the strategic interests of America and China - and chose China".
Arthur Lauder, a professor of international relations at the University of Pennsylvania, concurred. He said the Chinese military "is the only one being developed anywhere in the world today that is specifically configured to fight the United States
The Japanese government, of course, backs the US position that China constitutes a military threat to the entire region. Interestingly enough, however, the Australian government of Prime Minister John Howard, a loyal ally of the United States when it comes to Iraq, has decided to defy Bush on the issue of lifting the European arms embargo. Australia places a high premium on good relations with China and is hoping to negotiate a free-trade agreement between the two countries. Canberra has therefore decided to support the EU in lifting the 15-year-old embargo. Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder both say, "It will happen."
China is openly courting many Latin American countries regardless of what Washington thinks.
In the weeks that followed, China signed important investment and trade agreements with Argentina, Venezuela, Bolivia, Chile and Cuba. Of particular interest, in December, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela visited China and agreed to give it wide-ranging access to his country's oil reserves. Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest oil exporter and normally sells about 60% of its output to the United States, but under the new agreements China will be allowed to operate 15 mature oilfields in eastern Venezuela. China will invest about $350 million to extract oil and another $60 million in natural-gas wells.
Last December, the ASEAN countries and China also agreed to create a free-trade zone among themselves by 2010.
China is the primary moving force behind these efforts. According to Funabashi, China's leadership plans to use the country's explosive economic growth and its ever more powerful links to regional trading partners to marginalize the United States and isolate Japan in East Asia.
Why should China's emergence as a rich, successful country be to the disadvantage of either Japan or the United States? History teaches us that the least intelligent response to this development would be to try to stop it through military force. As a Hong Kong wisecrack has it, China has just had a couple of bad centuries and now it's back
was sorta bored, got enthralled, my condensensed extract version follows
plus also this positive economic article for todays bears
http://www.aireview.com/index.php?act=v ... =8&id=1567
since the end of the Cold War in 1991 and particularly under the administration of George W Bush, the United States has been doing everything in its power to encourage and even accelerate Japanese rearmament
Can the United States and Japan, today's versions of rich, established powers, adjust to the re-emergence of China
The truly significant trade development of 2004 was the EU's emergence as China's biggest economic partner, suggesting the possibility of a Sino-European cooperative bloc
China's trade with Europe in 2004 was worth $177.2 billion, with the United States $169.6 billion, and with Japan $167.8 billion.
Most important, China's external debt is relatively small and easily covered by its reserves; whereas both the US and Japan are approximately $7 trillion in the red, which is worse for Japan, with less than half the US population and economic clout
Ironically, part of Japan's debt is a product of its efforts to help prop up America's global imperial stance. For example, in the period since the end of the Cold War, Japan has subsidized America's military bases in Japan to the staggering tune of approximately $70 billion. Refusing to pay for its profligate consumption patterns and military expenditures through taxes on its own citizens, the United States is financing these outlays by going into debt to Japan, China, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong and India. This situation has become increasingly unstable as the US requires capital imports of at least $2 billion per day to pay for its governmental expenditures. Any decision by East Asian central banks to move significant parts of their foreign-exchange reserves out of the US dollar and into the euro or other currencies to protect themselves from dollar depreciation would produce the mother of all financial crises.
Japan still possesses the world's largest foreign-exchange reserves, which at the end of January stood at around $841 billion. But China sits on a $609.9 billion pile of dollars (as of the end of 2004)
"We see the special relationship between the United States and Great Britain as a model for the [US-Japan] alliance."
The Bush administration is seeking, among other things, an end to Japan's ban on the export of military technology, since it wants Japanese engineers to help solve some of the technical problems of its so-far-failing Star Wars system
What Japan currently lacks are the platforms (such as submarines) for a secure retaliatory force in order to dissuade a nuclear adversary from launching a preemptive first strike. (assuming it builds nukes, has the means)
Taiwan might try to seek a status somewhat like that of French Canada - a kind of looser version of a Chinese Quebec under nominal central government control but maintaining separate institutions, laws and customs.
The mainland would be so relieved by this solution it would probably accept it, particularly if it could be achieved before the 2008 Beijing Olympics
By the summer of 2004, Bush strategists, distracted as they were by Iraq, again became alarmed over China's growing power and its potential to challenge US hegemony in East Asia.
On February 19 in Washington, it signed a new military agreement with Japan. For the first time, Japan joined the US administration in identifying security in the Taiwan Strait as a "common strategic objective". Nothing could have been more alarming to China's leaders than the revelation that Japan had decisively ended six decades of official pacifism by claiming a right to intervene in the Taiwan Strait.
t is possible that, in the years to come, Taiwan itself may recede in importance to be replaced by even more direct Sino-Japanese confrontations
nd he proposed joint Sino-Japanese exploration of possible oil resources in the offshore seas that both sides claim. All such gestures were ignored by Koizumi,
during World War II the Japanese killed approximately 23 million Chinese throughout East Asia
Matters came to a head in November at two important summit meetings: an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) gathering in Santiago, followed immediately by an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
Koizumi went out of his way to insult Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao in Vientiane. He said to Premier Wen, "It's about time for [China's] graduation"
On November 10, the Japanese navy discovered a Chinese nuclear submarine in Japanese territorial waters near Okinawa. Although the Chinese apologized and called the sub's intrusion a "mistake"
Over time this downward spiral in relations will probably prove damaging to the interests of both the United States and Japan, but particularly to those of Japan. China is unlikely to retaliate directly
Nearly 70,000 Chinese students now study at Japanese universities, compared with 65,000 at US academic institutions. These close and lucrative relations are at risk if the US and Japan pursue their militarization of the region.
French foreign-policy think-tanks have long promoted the goal of 'multipolarity' in a post-Cold War world, ie, the preference for many different, competing power centers rather than the 'unipolarity' of the US as a single hyperpower. Multipolarity is no longer simply a strategic goal. It is an emerging reality."
Ninety-eight percent of Japan's imports from Iran are oil.) On February 18, 2004, a consortium of Japanese companies and the Iranian government signed a memorandum of agreement to develop jointly Iran's Azadegan oilfield, one of the world's largest, in a project worth $2.8 billion. The US has opposed Japan's support for Iran, causing Congressman Brad Sherman (Democrat, California) to charge that Bush had been bribed into accepting the Japanese-Iranian deal by Koizumi's dispatch of 550 Japanese troops to Iraq, adding a veneer of international support for the US war there.
But the long-standing Iranian-Japanese alignment began to change in late 2004. On October 28, China's oil major, the Sinopec Group, signed an agreement with Iran worth between $70 billion and $100 billion to develop the giant Yadavaran natural-gas field. China agreed to buy 250 million tons of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Iran over 25 years. It is the largest deal Iran has signed with a foreign country since 1996 and will include several other benefits, including China's assistance in building numerous ships to deliver the LNG to Chinese ports. Iran also committed itself to exporting 150,000 barrels of crude oil per day to China for 25 years at market prices.
The US has also charged China with selling nuclear and missile technology to Iran.
The European Union is China's largest trading partner and China is the EU's second-largest trading partner (after the United States
Back in 1989, to protest the suppression of pro-democracy demonstrators in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, the EU imposed a ban on military sales to China. The only other countries so treated are true international pariahs such as Myanmar, Sudan and Zimbabwe
On a visit to Beijing in October, he said that China and France share "a common vision of the world" and that lifting the embargo will "mark a significant milestone: a moment when Europe had to make a choice between the strategic interests of America and China - and chose China".
Arthur Lauder, a professor of international relations at the University of Pennsylvania, concurred. He said the Chinese military "is the only one being developed anywhere in the world today that is specifically configured to fight the United States
The Japanese government, of course, backs the US position that China constitutes a military threat to the entire region. Interestingly enough, however, the Australian government of Prime Minister John Howard, a loyal ally of the United States when it comes to Iraq, has decided to defy Bush on the issue of lifting the European arms embargo. Australia places a high premium on good relations with China and is hoping to negotiate a free-trade agreement between the two countries. Canberra has therefore decided to support the EU in lifting the 15-year-old embargo. Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder both say, "It will happen."
China is openly courting many Latin American countries regardless of what Washington thinks.
In the weeks that followed, China signed important investment and trade agreements with Argentina, Venezuela, Bolivia, Chile and Cuba. Of particular interest, in December, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela visited China and agreed to give it wide-ranging access to his country's oil reserves. Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest oil exporter and normally sells about 60% of its output to the United States, but under the new agreements China will be allowed to operate 15 mature oilfields in eastern Venezuela. China will invest about $350 million to extract oil and another $60 million in natural-gas wells.
Last December, the ASEAN countries and China also agreed to create a free-trade zone among themselves by 2010.
China is the primary moving force behind these efforts. According to Funabashi, China's leadership plans to use the country's explosive economic growth and its ever more powerful links to regional trading partners to marginalize the United States and isolate Japan in East Asia.
Why should China's emergence as a rich, successful country be to the disadvantage of either Japan or the United States? History teaches us that the least intelligent response to this development would be to try to stop it through military force. As a Hong Kong wisecrack has it, China has just had a couple of bad centuries and now it's back
regards
adrian
adrian
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by Disco Stu » Tue Mar 22, 2005 9:32 am
Cheers adrian, got to commend you on cherry picking the best bits out of the article. Sort of got the impression from the writer that where as the Japanese have felt obliged to support the US Govts proliferancy, China is less likely to provide that same support.
When the time is right and it suits their purpose I fully expect the Chinese to withdraw that support - irrespective of any potential short term harm to Chinese industry (remembering that the Chinese have a different idea of what constitutes short term... when the Chinese leader, Chou En-lai (1898-1976), was asked for his assessment of the effect of the 18th century French Revolution he paused for a moment and then said: 'It's too early to tell.')
Your aireview article shows that many of the analysts out there have consistantly underestimated the strength and the momentum of China's growth, just as they failed to predict it in the first place. That said 24.5% growth cannot go on indefinately and begs the quesiton "for how much longer?"
When the time is right and it suits their purpose I fully expect the Chinese to withdraw that support - irrespective of any potential short term harm to Chinese industry (remembering that the Chinese have a different idea of what constitutes short term... when the Chinese leader, Chou En-lai (1898-1976), was asked for his assessment of the effect of the 18th century French Revolution he paused for a moment and then said: 'It's too early to tell.')
Your aireview article shows that many of the analysts out there have consistantly underestimated the strength and the momentum of China's growth, just as they failed to predict it in the first place. That said 24.5% growth cannot go on indefinately and begs the quesiton "for how much longer?"
Disco Stu is leaving the building... he can sometimes be found at http://asxsharenerd.wikispaces.com/
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by typehigh » Tue Mar 22, 2005 11:25 am
congragulations disco stu for the great article,also adrian for condensing it to the bare bones.
china has come a long way from the time many years ago when a chinese official said china could conquer australia without firing a shot,simply by shipping so many women and children over here that we would be overrun trying too feed them all,as we couldn't kill them,or let them starve.whether the logistics involved were feasible,i don't know.
with all the hype surrounding china,i feel that some people forget the chinese will have their own agenda and if they decide to pull their economy back a bit they will.
also vw is having problems over there with the chinese cloning one of the models they are producing for them,then undercutting them so all may not be as clear cut as it seems at a distance
brian
china has come a long way from the time many years ago when a chinese official said china could conquer australia without firing a shot,simply by shipping so many women and children over here that we would be overrun trying too feed them all,as we couldn't kill them,or let them starve.whether the logistics involved were feasible,i don't know.
with all the hype surrounding china,i feel that some people forget the chinese will have their own agenda and if they decide to pull their economy back a bit they will.
also vw is having problems over there with the chinese cloning one of the models they are producing for them,then undercutting them so all may not be as clear cut as it seems at a distance
brian
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by Full Time Investor » Tue Mar 22, 2005 11:51 am
deleted
Last edited by Full Time Investor on Wed Mar 30, 2005 4:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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by adrianjt » Wed Mar 23, 2005 10:00 am
jb were remain of the view "stronger for longer"
http://www.aireview.com/index.php?act=v ... =8&id=1582
http://www.aireview.com/index.php?act=v ... =8&id=1582
regards
adrian
adrian
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by Harpeau » Thu Mar 24, 2005 3:41 pm
If I look out of my window, i see cranes standing tall.
Interest rates for borrowings have remained the same for many years, until recently when they started to rise. 5.1 to 5.3%. Hoped to cool the real estate market. It hasnt happend yet, so there's another interest rate rise due, 5.3 to 6.1 % for new borrows it has immediate effect, for those already established with home loans, it comes into effect later this year or begiinng next year.
Also going introduce a property tax which is progressive depending on how many homes you own, with aim to discourgae owning more homes than you can live in.
Petrol prices rose across the board yesterday by 10%, and the buses are jam packed. Water consumption prices set to rise, rumor is it will double, to bad the quality doesnt do the same. Energy prices going up to, nuclear is the way the way of the future and China will embrace it.
And all the while we are holding cash waiting for a Yuan to appreciate in value. It's going to be a hot summer.
inflation and investment, check it out
http://yahoo.reuters.com/financeQuoteCo ... 507_newsml
Interest rates for borrowings have remained the same for many years, until recently when they started to rise. 5.1 to 5.3%. Hoped to cool the real estate market. It hasnt happend yet, so there's another interest rate rise due, 5.3 to 6.1 % for new borrows it has immediate effect, for those already established with home loans, it comes into effect later this year or begiinng next year.
Also going introduce a property tax which is progressive depending on how many homes you own, with aim to discourgae owning more homes than you can live in.
Petrol prices rose across the board yesterday by 10%, and the buses are jam packed. Water consumption prices set to rise, rumor is it will double, to bad the quality doesnt do the same. Energy prices going up to, nuclear is the way the way of the future and China will embrace it.
And all the while we are holding cash waiting for a Yuan to appreciate in value. It's going to be a hot summer.
inflation and investment, check it out
http://yahoo.reuters.com/financeQuoteCo ... 507_newsml
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CHINA and it's Energy
by cungevoi » Fri Mar 25, 2005 7:51 am
You can just imagine 1.4 billion budding entrpereneurs working their hearts out, to get their share. China added 400 new millionaires to it's list this year. Hang on for the ride. Cheers.
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by hybridbloke » Fri Mar 25, 2005 8:56 am
wool is one of the commodities i produce----china is now the destination for raw wool,as the processing facilities shift there for the cheap labour,and freedom from enviromental regulations.it is a supply boom,but a profitless one-------china takes it all at a price--------long term contracts are fine until the spot price falls under contract price,then it is basically accepted practise to walk away from the contract.once critical mass is achieved to be able to control the market,it is used.the chinese market is fully supplied right now by ruthless chinese dragons engaged in a life or death enterprise,and an assault on it by donkeys can only end one way.----fresh meat,home delivered.
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by typehigh » Fri Mar 25, 2005 9:20 am
I know a director of a firm supplying timber.A chinese company wanted a price for a container load,then a price for 10 container loads,then 24 containers.My friend walked away from them when they ordered 1 container,but wanted it at the unit price for 24.They will always look after their own interest,unfortunately we cannot always be in a position to do the same.For years the Japanese kept the price of coking coal depressed by playing us off against south American miners.
Brian
Brian
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by Harpeau » Sun Mar 27, 2005 8:31 pm
eg
from my observations in Beijing, there are many many poeple who have direct and indirect axcess to large amounts of money and services. The source of much of this wealth is 'artificial' in the sense that it is derived from the state (for example as bank loans gone bad, or spin-off's from state owned enterprises whose assets are misappropriated etc etc). The government also spends heavily in infrastructure.
Places to invest money is limited, savings interest rates are very low at about 2%, the stock market -with its chronic insider trading and the downturn a couple of years back - has caused people to be cautious. People are holding lots of cash and one alternative has been to invest in real estate.
The government is trying to stimulate the economy through private consumption. Resteraunts, department stores, travel are fantatsic businesses. Holidays which were in the past only 1 or 2 days such as may day or national day , have now each been turned into 1 week holidays in the hope that people will travel and spend up big. This really seems to have worked and these are now refered to locally as "golden weeks".
Some negatives that I see are the majority of the population is disenfranchised and have no opportunity to enjoy the benefits of the rises in standards of living. Rising living costs can only exacerbate this problem. Economic and violent crimes are everywhere and are serious problems for law and order. Every area you can imagine in society has been turned into a money marker, often illegally and to the detriment of the great good of the people or the spirit of the law. Pollution and environment is horrid. Life is cheap and society doesnt seem to be too stable here.
I would be real careful about companies coming to China to catch the economic miracle. Hybridbloke's and Typehigh's coments would be pretty indicative of how its done here and what the attitudes are.
Check out the recent fuss with Fortescue and their Chinese connections. Is it good business on part of the Chinese? i dont know, but I know its about typical.
nevertheless, a very pragmatic approach to doing business and building connections, can be quite rewarding here.
from my observations in Beijing, there are many many poeple who have direct and indirect axcess to large amounts of money and services. The source of much of this wealth is 'artificial' in the sense that it is derived from the state (for example as bank loans gone bad, or spin-off's from state owned enterprises whose assets are misappropriated etc etc). The government also spends heavily in infrastructure.
Places to invest money is limited, savings interest rates are very low at about 2%, the stock market -with its chronic insider trading and the downturn a couple of years back - has caused people to be cautious. People are holding lots of cash and one alternative has been to invest in real estate.
The government is trying to stimulate the economy through private consumption. Resteraunts, department stores, travel are fantatsic businesses. Holidays which were in the past only 1 or 2 days such as may day or national day , have now each been turned into 1 week holidays in the hope that people will travel and spend up big. This really seems to have worked and these are now refered to locally as "golden weeks".
Some negatives that I see are the majority of the population is disenfranchised and have no opportunity to enjoy the benefits of the rises in standards of living. Rising living costs can only exacerbate this problem. Economic and violent crimes are everywhere and are serious problems for law and order. Every area you can imagine in society has been turned into a money marker, often illegally and to the detriment of the great good of the people or the spirit of the law. Pollution and environment is horrid. Life is cheap and society doesnt seem to be too stable here.
I would be real careful about companies coming to China to catch the economic miracle. Hybridbloke's and Typehigh's coments would be pretty indicative of how its done here and what the attitudes are.
Check out the recent fuss with Fortescue and their Chinese connections. Is it good business on part of the Chinese? i dont know, but I know its about typical.
nevertheless, a very pragmatic approach to doing business and building connections, can be quite rewarding here.
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