Economy/Resources - 222. page

China Youth Daily published a report about the enourmous land and water resources that Beijing’s 75 golf courses use. In terms of land, they use 132, 257.75 mu (about 881,713 acres), which is 0.5% of the total area under the Beijing administrative jurisdiction. The daily consumption of water is at least 168,700 cubic feet, amounting to 60 million cubic feet of water resources every year. Due to Beijing’s shortage of water, twice in 2010 Beijing diverted water from other provinces. In October 2010 alone, about 40 million cubic feet was diverted to Beijing.

Source: China Youth Daily, September 7, 2010
http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2011-09/07/c_121990086.htm

On September 6, 2011, People’s Daily Online published an article suggesting that China should increase its gold reserves when the time is right.

“The strategic significance of increasing gold reserves is to relieve the risk to our foreign exchange reserves. China’s foreign exchange reserves exceed US$3 trillion, of which 70% is in U.S. dollar denominated assets. Due to the current structure of our foreign exchange reserves, the security of our national wealth is highly dependent on the United States. If the U.S. dollar continues to depreciate, our foreign exchange reserves will shrink dramatically. At an appropriate time, (we should) convert part of our foreign exchange reserves into gold reserves. When the U.S. dollar depreciates, the price of gold will rise, which will make up for our loss due to the depreciation of U.S. dollar assets, ease the risk to our foreign exchange reserves, and safeguard our national wealth.”

"According to World Gold Council (WGC) data on every country’s gold reserves, in August, the United States’ gold reserves were 8,133.5 tons, which amounts to 74 percent of all of its foreign currency reserves; China’s gold reserves were a little more than 1,000 tons, which amounts to only 1.6 percent of China’s total foreign reserves, ranking it sixth in the world."

Source: People’s Daily Online, September 6, 2011
http://finance.people.com.cn/GB/15595252.html

On August 9, 2011, the National Bureau of Statistics of China released data showing that the CPI rose 6.5 percent in July, the biggest increase in 37 months. On August 16, 2011, Xinhua News Agency’s Outlook Weekly published an article pointing out that when state-owned enterprises raise prices, the government has difficulty regulating inflation. The article referenced several interviews that emphasized the responsibility of state-owned enterprises to stabilize prices. 

One interviewee said, “Many commodities have higher prices because of higher labor and raw material costs. It is the monopolies in the electric, oil, and petrochemical industries that charge more for raw materials. These industries earn high profits, but still raise prices several times a year. It is clearly neither reasonable nor fair to request private enterprises and consumers to bear the consequences of higher prices.” Another interviewee said, “Since state-owned enterprises use China’s national resources and enjoy state subsidies, they should assume the important task of stabilizing prices. They cannot stress their state-owned background when they want subsidies, but emphasize the market mechanism when they want to increase prices.”

The article concluded, “Many experts believe that it is the people who own state-owned enterprises. In the more and more severe circumstance of managing inflation, state-owned enterprises should take more social responsibility.”

Source: Xinhua News Agency’s Outlook Weekly, August 16, 2011,
http://www.lwgcw.com/NewsShow.aspx?newsId=22795

Qiushi, a flagship publication of the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Committee, republished an article from People’s Daily on the topic of pushing the cultural industry forward. The article suggested improvements needed in four areas: (1) the investment structure needs to be optimized to allow more investors; (2) the technological structure needs to be optimized in order to utilize more cutting-edge technologies; (3) the cultural industry product structure needs to be optimized for better branding and design; (4) the industry’s organizational structure needs to be optimized to introduce more enhancements to state owned cultural enterprises. The article expressed the belief that, to meet the requirements of the Party, the industry must successfully unify both ideology attributes and economic attributes .

Source: Qiushi, August 3, 2011
http://www.qstheory.cn/wh/whcy/201108/t20110803_99214.htm

China Review News (CRN) recently published an article discussing the strategy for China’s sustainable growth after the U.S. debt crisis. The article pointed out two main challenges: (1) the investment-based growth model needs adjustment; (2) the export-oriented economy must change its focus to a unified domestic market. The article suggested that China has a similar debt risk from its large local government debt total of RMB 10.7 trillion. Meanwhile, currently, Chinese exports concentrate on sectors that have a thin profit margin; the large trade volume does not generate a high profit. The author concluded that, unless the current growth model switches to the domestic market, it will be hard to recover from the damage caused by the U.S debt crisis.

Source: China Review News, August 10, 2011
http://gb.chinareviewnews.com/doc/1017/9/4/6/101794661.html?coluid=53&kindid=0&docid=101794661&mdate=0810071138

On August 12, People’s Bank of China released its “2011 Second Quarter Report on the Implementation of China’s Monetary Policy,” which emphasized that China’s monetary policy in the second half of 2011 remains unchanged. Stabilizing commodity prices will continue to be the top priority of its macro-economic control measures. The report also stated that the Central Bank will increase the flexibility of its policy to make it more targeted and predictable so that it will help to balance the relationship between maintaining economic growth, adjusting the economic structure, and managing inflation expectation.

Source: China News Service, August 12, 2011
http://www.chinanews.com/cj/2011/08-12/3255226.shtml

According to a commentary in Beijing Times, China should be on guard for four uncertainties in its economy. The first uncertainty is whether China can continue to rely on the investment model of the high speed rail. “Presently the Ministry of Railways is under tremendous pressure due to high debts and low passenger usage. In the event that (this type of) investment is significantly scaled back and this engine is lost, can China maintain a high growth economy?” The second uncertainty comes from mid-size to small businesses which are the life blood of China’s economy. The third uncertainty is whether inflation control is effective. It is anticipated that the inflation rate will be as high as 6.7% for July. The fourth uncertainty is the large reduction in the GDP growth rates for Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and other cities, which may be a sign of a slowdown of China’s GDP.

Source: BeijingTimes, August 9, 2011
http://news.jinghua.cn/348/c/201108/09/n3428025.shtml

According to People’s Daily, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has issued data showing that, from January to May 2011, China’s domestic apparent consumption (production plus net imports) of oil reached 198 million tons, an increase of 10.3 percent over the same period last year. The apparent consumption of crude oil was 191 million tons, an increase of 8.5 percent. China relies on imports for 55.2 percent of its crude oil consumption, a proportion surpassing that of the U.S. MIIT warned that China’s oil consumption outpaces its GDP growth, placing tremendous pressure on energy production and conservation, as well as the reduction of emissions. The Chinese Academy of Engineering projects that, by 2030, even under a pessimistic scenario, China’s annual oil demand will reach 644 million tons. Without proper control, China may have to import 70 percent of the oil it consumes.

Source: People’s Daily online, August 4, 2011
http://energy.people.com.cn/GB/15324102.html