10 Ways China is Changing the World
This slide show and narrative originally appeared in Business Insider.
See the Financial Post: http://business.financialpost.com/2012/07/07/10-ways-china-is-transforming-the-world/
The piece is right that China indeed will wield immense clout in shale gas, rare earth, agricultural and industrial commodities and consumption generally going forward, along with burgeoning car production and sales and numerous other sectors. For Canada, in terms of shale gas, the author writes, once exploited China’s massive reserves will render the proposed gas pipeline to the BC coast much less attractive.
That China will be the world’s largest economy at the earliest by the end of the this decade (or more conservatively by mid next decade) and the RMB will be fully convertible by that time to challenge the supremacy of the dollar is also on the right track. (see an earlier post on the planned Shenzhen Qianhai experiment in RMB internationalization)
China’s fast emerging naval fleet is in step with its pace of development and need to protect economic and territorial interests. Instead of harping on China’s military, one must fundamentally question America’s pivot to Asia where it will deploy 60% of its naval forces.
The author questions China’s ‘state capitalism’ but the Chinese model is swiftly evolving in which the weight of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) is shrinking year by year. China’s authorities and press openly criticize the high prices for goods and services charged by the largest SOE providers. The ‘developmental state’ has been part and parcel of the early development of East Asian economies, namely, in Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore. Given the size of China, the gradual transformation to an overwhelmingly private economy will takes decades. A recent book by a renowned Arab writer argues that many developing countries are closely monitoring the transformation of the Chinese economy in search of ideas and methods for their own growth.
The author links the explosive growth in China’s IT software and hardware industry to heightening cyber attacks against Western interests but advancements in technology are always a double-edged sword and exploited for political and strategic goals. In this connection, he should, for instance, examine the West and Israel’s attacks against Iran and other ‘enemy’ states.
The author is dead wrong about China’s so-called ‘ghost cities’ and their ‘export’ to parts of Africa. As urbanization continues and speeds up over the next two decades and longer, those currently empty buildings will be filled up in quick fashion. As for Africa, China’s builds them for clients who have the responsibility to market them or otherwise allocate them to needy local residents.
But, aside from failing to mention China’s many strides in S & T such as in aerospace, the author missed the potentially biggest impact of all – China’s growing capacity for high-tech innovation. As featured in an earlier post, KPMG’s latest survey of high-tech CEOs and venture capitalists predicts the hub of global high-tech innovation will shift from the US to China over the next four years. In the post, I point to Cloud computing as a prime example where China is racing past the rest of the world.