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Spring is finally here and with it comes the urge to watch greenery grow. What better time than now to check out some of Shanghai’s best Bird & Flower markets? We’ve checked out several around Shanghai that are relatively easy to get to from city center – greenify your life today! [ more › ]
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This is how CCTV Tower (in Beijing) would look like if it moved to Stockholm next to Globen. Globen is Stockholm’s tallest building.
Picture comes from http://kristeribeijing.blogspot.com/
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Almost forgot to post this one: Carrefour will hold its Beijing spring wine fair is this weekend at the Shuangjing store. As usual, bring your own glasses unless you want to sip out of some tiny egg cup-like vessel. This is usually a pretty good time, mainly because it is free, though the last one [...]
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Hundreds of angry truck drivers blockaded Shanghai’s Baoshan port yesterday as part of a three day strike against rising fuel prices and higher handling fees charged by the port. [ more › ]
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TimeOut magazine and Chifan for Charity are teaming up with more than two dozen restaurants for charity dinners on April 24 to raise funds for victims of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Proceeds from the night will go the Japanese Red Cross Society. The dinners at Agua, Mosto and Modo are already sold out [...]
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Our weekly pick of the last week’s China business news is below… GDP & inflation: @shanghaidaily Shanghai Daily China’s economy expanded 9.7% in Q1 2011 from a year earlier, while inflation in March hits 32-month peak of 5.4%. http://xpo.sh/1ou (see also: GDP, stats RT @NiuB: China Partly Lifts Veil on GDP Data – WSJ http://on.wsj.com/gCTZdv) [...]
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The EIU kindly sent us a copy of their new report on China’s housing boom (not an overblown bubble), and some introductiory details (below). It is a very topical issue, and a good follow-up to the previous report on fast-growing cities (CHAMPS – that we noted here). “Fears of a major housing bubble in China [...]
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10 days ago, we posted a story about an imminent announcement regarding new restrictions on smelter construction. See here for that post.
The announcement came out yesterday. China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), together with other ministries including the NDRC, has published a notice on their website calling for curtailments across the board.
Our reaction to this announcement is unchanged from last week. We have no plans to slash wrists or declare an end to the world as we know it. Certainly we do not see any sudden change to our long-term views about import levels.
The announcement does not affect new smelters or expansions, if they have already moved from the drawing board to an engineering stage or later. Second, it is aimed at ensuring the new plants are a certain size and efficiency.
One needs to read the fine print. The relevant ministries are seeking to bring more balance to the industry. In the announcement, they quote capacity utilisation percentages as low as 70%, and low profit margins for the existing participants. It’s this that they are seeking to redress.
To gain a better understanding, let’s look at some of the bigger projects that are out there in the future. East Hope’s new smelter will not be affected, despite the fact that it’s long term design calls for total capacity of 3 million tonnes. Shenhuo’s new smelter in Xinjiang will not affected, and it will be 1.6 million tonnes.
By our analysis, some 19 projects will not be affected. Those projects have a total capacity of around 8 million tonnes.
Unfortunately for us, our more phlegmatic view isn’t the stuff of headlines. No doubt the more radical the reaction to this announcement, the more that the press will lap it up. But we would rather be accurate that sensational.
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Arguably, there are currently only two superpowers on the planet: the United States and China. Now that the world is growing increasingly dependent on the Internet, how do these two giants stack up online?
Ten years ago, the United States was by far the largest country on the Internet. That is no longer the case. It’s been pushed into second place by China, with quite some margin. Together these two countries now make up over 33% of the Internet. China alone makes up 51% of the Asian Internet population.
The United States has a huge lead over China when it comes to the actual Internet penetration, i.e. the share of its population that has access to the Internet. An interesting note here is that China has a ton of room to grow, while the United States doesn’t. To give you an idea: If China had the same Internet penetration as the United States, it would have over a billion Internet users.
Read the full article on royal.pingdom.com »
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On June 19th a direct flight will start from Chengdu to Tokyo. There will be one flight everyday from Chengdu at 9:00 and Tokyo at 17:35. This will allow for better economic exchange between Japan and Southwestern China. Flight number: NH947/948.
