PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

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Gus
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Gus »

huh..Chinese need to get thin? they are thin as it is...

There could be something about this...We had a Chinese attend on of our training, who said her most embarrassing moment was when she was shopping back in China, the shop did not have clothes that fit her...and she was reed thin.
shynee
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by shynee »

EU wants power to block China's technology purchasing power
The European Union's industry commissioner wants the power to block China from buying up European tech companies.

Commissioner Antonio Tajani made the comments in an interview with German daily paper Handelsblatt. Europe should establish a new authority with powers to block foreign takeovers of strategic European businesses, he said. "Chinese companies have the means to buy more and more European enterprises with key technologies in important sectors," said Tajani.

The commissioner envisions an authority along the same lines as the United States' Committee on Foreign Investment. The proposed E.U. authority would determine "if the acquisition (of a company) with European know-how by a private or public foreign company represented a danger or not".

The comments will likely strain even further the already tense China-E.U. trade relations. There are currently a number of Commission investigations of Chinese firms under way. E.U. companies also argue that China should also remove its restrictions on foreign investment to ensure a level playing field.
ArmenT
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by ArmenT »

From slashdot.org, a link to sina.org.cn explaining how China acquired hi-speed rail technology.
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/11/01/01 ... cs-Exposed

It is a very interesting read.
krisna
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by krisna »

China makes Russian calculations
On New Year’s Day, a Chinese bureaucrat pushed a button in the northeastern border province of Heilongjiang to inaugurate a monumental oil pipeline between Russian Siberia and the Chinese city of Daqing. Built at a cost of $25 billion, the 1,000-kilometre-long conduit ties the world’s largest oil producer—Russia—and the second largest oil consumer—China—into an ever tighter relationship that has significant implications for energy cooperation and world order.
As a stable neighbour with whom China has already settled territorial border disputes, energy-endowed Russia is a natural choice to invest in for the sake of steady crude oil imports.
It is in Russia’s economic interests that Japan and South Korea also buy maximum possible oil from Siberia the way China is beginning to. Moscow has adopted a long-term market diversification strategy—termed the ‘energy window to Asia’—in a bid to wean itself away from overdependence on European customers. The parallel growth of the eastern Siberian routes to Asia is a deliberate attempt on the part of Russia to correct its previous heavy leaning on the western Siberian pipeline network that is geared towards eastern and central Europe.
In the last decade, Russia and China have aligned to counterbalance the US in Central Asia, East Asia and across major international institutions. The two swallowed considerable nationalistic pride to finalise a territorial concession of 67 square miles in 2008 by Russia to China against the backdrop of a ‘new Cold War’ with the US under George W Bush.
zlin
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by zlin »

Lenovo 'LePad' combines tablet, laptop in one

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

LAS VEGAS - Chinese computer colossus Lenovo on Tuesday unveiled an IdeaPad computer that serves as a laptop for work tasks then converts to a touch-screen tablet for play time.

The IdeaPad U1 hybrid, with a "LePad" slate that serves as a laptop screen but unplugs to become a tablet computer, made its debut on the cusp of the Thursday opening of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

"It is one device to balance life and work," Lenovo product manager Leo Li told AFP.

"A keyboard is more important and Windows software more powerful for a lot of things you need to work, especially productivity and creating content," he continued. "At the same time, people want to enjoy music, see videos, go to websites, read e-books, and play games in their personal lives."

The LePad tablet is powered by Android software backed by California Internet giant Google and a Snapdragon chip from Qualcomm.

Once plugged into the keyboard base, the computer switches to Windows 7 operating software by Microsoft and a beefier Intel processor.

Lenovo is targeting consumers who embrace today's mobile lifestyle.

"Use the light-weight slate when you're mobile, and then simply slide it into the U1 base when you need to create and edit content," Lenovo Idea Product Group vice president Liu Jun said.

LePad has a 10.1-inch (26 centimeter) color screen, weighs less than two pounds (one kilogram) and connects to the Internet using 3G telecom service.

It has a front-facing camera for video chat and promises as many as eight hours of battery life.

IdeaPad U1 with LePad will be available in China by the end of March but won't be available in the United States until next-generation Android mobile software is available for use in the tablets.

IdeaPad U1 with LePad will be priced at 8,888 Chinese yuan ($1,340) and the tablet will be sold separately for 3,499 Chinese yuan ($528).

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Raja Bose
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Raja Bose »

The LePad is fundamentally a bad idea esp. due to lack of interoperability between Android and Win7 which results in fragmented UX. They did show it off in CES 2010 also.
vina
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by vina »

Raja Bose wrote:The LePad is fundamentally a bad idea esp. due to lack of interoperability between Android and Win7 which results in fragmented UX. They did show it off in CES 2010 also.
How dare you question and critique the wisdom of something done by PRC and it's "prestigious " company like Lenovo. It was after all vetted by a committee , had the sign of the CPC imprimatur and you pip squeak dare critique it and simply not go to a store like a lemming and hand over your cash to get it!

Off you go the the le-education camp for hard labor and self criticism and introspection.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Singha »

as expected Spain is the next stop - they are moving from the weakest link in PIIGS upward....poor spain, once it ruled the western hemisphere with red tooth , claw and a iron fist - reduced to selling ham, olive oil , wine and meat to make a living :rotfl:

China pledges to support Spain as $7bn in trade deals are forged
Jean Yung From: The Wall Street Journal January 06, 2011 8:43AM

CHINESE Vice Premier Li Keqiang reiterated Beijing's pledge to support Spain as the two countries began signing $7.3 billion in deals.

Mr Li, widely expected to become China's next premier within the next two years, told the country's prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero that China wanted a united, strong and stable Europe, with Spain an important player in multilateral international relations.

"China is a long-term and responsible investor in the Spanish and European financial markets, and it has confidence and great interest in the Spanish market," Mr Li said on the second day of a nine-day tour of the European Union in a show of support for China's largest export market.

The contracts cover 16 sectors, including energy, banking, telecommunications, transport and agriculture, but by far the most valuable one was the sealing of a previously announced $US7.1bn acquisition of certain Brazilian assets of Spanish oil firm Repsol by China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation, or Sinopec.

Spain's Industry Ministry also said that Spain and China will "strengthen their relationship" in the energy sector and collaborate on foreign investments.

Mr Li said Beijing would welcome Spanish financial companies launching operations in China.

Spain's second largest bank, Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria, signed a co-operation agreement for Latin America with China Development Bank, BBVA said.

The two hope to work together in project finance, commercial services, derivatives and corporate banking, the Spanish lender said.

BBVA is the largest Spanish investor in China, where it has a 15 per cent stake in China Citic Bank Corporation.

Among other contracts to be signed were deals for China to purchase $US13.5 million of meat products, $US9m of olive oil, $US6m of wine and $US260,000 of ham from Spain, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

Mr Li said China will likely purchase more Spanish government bonds depending on market conditions after a meeting with Spanish Economy and Finance Minister Elena Salgado, Xinhua reported earlier.China is one of the biggest owners of Spain's sovereign debt, holding around 10 per cent of the total.


Mr Li's comments come as China aims to strengthen ties with the EU, its biggest trading partner, and amid continued pressure from Washington, which is urging Beijing to let the yuan appreciate faster to reduce the trade imbalance with the US, China's next-largest trade partner.

China is keen to diversify more of its massive foreign-exchange reserves - at more than $US2.6 trillion, the world's largest - away from US dollar-denominated assets.

In December, Portuguese newspaper Jornal de Negócios reported that China would invest between €4bn ($5.3bn) and €5bn in Portuguese bonds to help Portugal refinance €15bn of debt due to expire before April.

China has expressed its support for countries including Portugal and Greece, but has yet to confirm any details of its bond purchases.

Spain is the first stop on Mr Li's visit to Europe, which will include visits to Germany and the UK.
shyamd
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by shyamd »

Off the record to journo's: Word on the street is, that he said he will send them rice if there is a crisis! LOL!
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Singha »

BBC - more signs in Europe who is the new paymaster and saviour of weak assets...

UK's Grangemouth oil refinery strikes Chinese deal
Grangemouth refinery Grangemouth is Scotland's biggest mainland oil refinery

The operators of the Grangemouth oil refinery have struck a deal with China's largest oil and gas producer to safeguard the future of the facility.

Grangemouth refinery operators Ineos announced the joint venture with PetroChina, which will see them work together and share skills.

A similar agreement has also been struck with France's Lavera refinery.

The deal was confirmed after Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang arrived for a four-day visit to the UK.

The UK visit by Mr Li - tipped to be China's next leader - aims to promote trade and political links between the two countries.

The Grangemouth deal will secure 2,000 Scottish jobs, the Scottish government said.

Ineos Chief executive Calum MacLean, said: "These deals are the start of a long-term relationship between Ineos and PetroChina, creating a partnership between one of the world's largest petrochemical companies and one of the world's largest energy companies.

"They present a clear opportunity for Ineos to progress its aim of forming strategic partnerships to help grow and strengthen its business.

"The agreements will provide further investment in our refineries, securing their competitiveness in European markets, and will secure jobs and skills in the UK and France."

Green deal

Si Bingjun, general manager of PetroChina International London, added: "The framework agreement to work towards forming trading and refining related joint ventures with Ineos is consistent with PetroChina's strategy of building a broader business platform in Europe and of becoming a leading international energy company."

The Grangemouth refinery, on the Firth of Forth, processes about 210,000 barrels of crude oil per day, providing fuel to Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland.

The Lavera refinery, which processes 210,000 barrels of crude oil on a daily basis, supplies fuel to France, Switzerland and southern Germany from its location on the coast of the Mediterranean crude oil trading basin.

Scottish Finance Secretary John Swinney said of the agreement: "Scotland has unrivalled energy resources and expertise, and the Scottish government is committed to working with China across this sector.

"The Grangemouth refinery is a strategic asset for Scotland and this announcement represents good news for Scotland and Scottish jobs."

It is hoped the detail of the agreements can be finalised by the end of June, after a period of consultation.

At the weekend, it was announced that Scotland and China had sealed a major green energy deal, worth $10m (£6.4m).

It will see technology pioneered in Scotland used at a new renewable energy conversion plant in China.
Singha
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Singha »

"work together and share skills" probably translates to china providing the funding to upg these plants and keep them afloat, while refining and chemicals technology will be shared to use in new or existing plants in China.
Prem
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Prem »

China's December exports up amid tensions
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/b ... trade.html
China's December exports rose by double digits, possibly fueling tension with Washington ahead of Chinese President Hu Jintao's U.S. visit next week.The country's politically sensitive trade surplus shrank to $13.1 billion, customs data showed Monday, but analysts said that decline was likely to be temporary and the gap should rebound later in the year.Hu meets President Barack Obama on Jan. 19 and the White House says Obama will press him over currency controls that critics say are swelling China's trade surplus and wiping out jobs abroad. Voter anger over the large and rising U.S. trade deficit with China became an issue in October elections."Surely the ongoing Chinese surplus with the U.S. and the world will be a point of contention" during Hu's visit, said economist David Cohen at Action Economics in Singapore.China's December exports rose 17.9 percent to $154 billion, down from November's 34.9 percent surge. Imports gained 25.6 percent over a year earlier to $141 billion, down from the previous month's 37.7 percent growth but reflecting China's relatively strong economic growth.December appeared to be the highest monthly exports yet for China, which overtook Germany in 2009 as the world's biggest exporter, according to Cohen.The trade surplus was the third-lowest monthly level in 2010. It was a 30 percent decline from the same month in 2009 and down sharply from November's $22.9 billion.But the smaller surplus was due partly to a temporary spike in the price of imported oil and other commodities even though the amounts imported declined, said Mark Williams of Capital Economics. He said that effect should pass quickly."We expect China's surplus to rebound in 2011," Williams said in a report.The decline from November's sharp trade growth was in line with forecasts by economists who said the jump was temporary and Christmas-related. December export growth was below the 20 percent forecast by many analysts but still reflected reviving global demand."Growth probably will be under 20 percent going forward, but something in this range is sustainable if the global recovery continues," said Cohen.China's full-year trade surplus in 2010 was $190 billion, according to customs data, down 3 percent from 2009's $196.1 billion.Exports rose 31.3 percent over 2009 to $1.58 trillion, while imports gained 38.7 percent to $1.39 trillion, the government reported.
Hari Seldon
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Hari Seldon »

^^^ PRC's remarkable ability to keep raising exports, by double digits at that, in the face of the global slowdown and raging unemployment in client economies defies belief and elicits grudging admiration only. PRC must really have EUstan and unkilstan by the b@lls to have successfully deterred protectionist action thus far. Of course, tomorrow is another day but so far I am yet to see concrete will and purpose in either DC or Brussels to do anything about PRC's mercantilism. Round 1,2 and 3 have all unambiguously gone to cheena. Only.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by wrdos »

The Chinese import is increasing at an even faster pace, right?
Neither US or EU can hurt China without hurting themselves, it is the fact.
Hari Seldon
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Hari Seldon »

^^^Maybe. But net net Beijing's trade surpluses have gone up, not down. Anyway, PRC's imports are mostly raw material variety from the turd world class.
wrdos
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by wrdos »

Chinese trade surplus decreased by about 6% in 2010.
Hari Seldon wrote:^^^Maybe. But net net Beijing's trade surpluses have gone up, not down. Anyway, PRC's imports are mostly raw material variety from the turd world class.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by sanjaykumar »

http://rothkopf.foreignpolicy.com/posts ... er_already

Is the Obama-Hu summit over already?

This comment on the article summarises China's dilemma nicely.


Your points about China's geopolitically calculated purchase of Spanish debt and its "carefully orchestrated" currency policy give Beijing far too much credit. Financial Times, Naked Capitalism, and Jack Barnes all had articles today about the perfect storm brewing within China, of forex hoarding, hasty wage increases, and the inflation that underpins all of it.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0c78740a-1cef ... ab49a.html
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/01/ ... ubble.html
http://jackhbarnes.com/2011/01/11/china ... ing-press/

The currency policy, as it stands, necessitates that China dump additional yuan onto the domestic market each time it accumulates additional forex (usually USD). Such a policy makes no sense in a country whose foremost economic ill is galloping inflation, unless of course, it is there merely to foster the easy monetary climate that leads to artificially high growth rates.

From the FT article:

"If China were to follow Japan, the next stage would be labour strife and inflation. The best way to avoid that outcome would be a radical tightening of the current super-easy monetary policy. But that would risk a serious slowdown and probably necessitate a large revaluation of the renminbi – both anathema to Beijing."

It has put off serious, substantial revaluation for years. The funny thing about the market, though, is that ultimately corrects imbalances, regardless of what any allegedly all-powerful state, like the PRC, tries to do.

From the Naked Capitalism spiel: "But, what if the they don’t? Inflation can take off and thereby begin to ERODE the competitiveness of Chinese exports. Nouriel Roubini pointed out this issue in 2007: if China didn’t revalue, inflation would do the trick regardless. A continued high rate of inflation relative to its trade partners would push up the price of goods in home currency terms, which in turn translates into higher export prices. This might be the real reason why China is so reticent to revalue its currency. The Americans might go crazy if the Chinese devalued, but if the inflation is high enough, they might have to do it, as it will severely erode their terms of trade and cause their tradeables sector to collapse."

Does that sound like a state that has carefully, rationally accounted for every last contingency?

The Spanish debt investment is foolish. From the Jack Barnes article:

"They are so dependent on demand growth, they have decided to try and prop up the European bureaucrats with fresh capital. These new private placements in European Sovereigns will help keep Europe from dissolving into a mess this winter, while allowing the problems to fester at both ends longer.

Combined, when Europe does shatter, it will hurt the China worse. They will have thrown away their national savings, on buying debt from an international organization that is dissolving under its own weight in front of everyone in the world. The leading party will have used up internal domestic creditability by publicly propping up a coalition of the unwilling to be economic governed with Chinese home savings."

How desperate is it to bail out Spain just to maintain some semblance of European demand to soak up China's trade surplus? Or perhaps China subconscoiusly sees a semblance of itself in Spain:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/18/world ... wanted=all
Katare
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Katare »

Singha wrote:BBC - more signs in Europe who is the new paymaster and saviour of weak assets....
It looks more like the cash rich businessmen/investor going around buying distressed assets for a bargain. When (or if :mrgreen: ) market picks up these investments might pay very handsomely. In time distress ones with cash on hand make obcene amount of money.

Early this decade (1998-2005) when they were gulping any and all oil assets for prices much higher than the market prices babus at ONGC were practicing prudent financing :P Since than oil has gone up from ~30-40 to ~$100, making all those assets worth many time what they were bought for. Investment requires guts, planning, opportunistic attitude with long term focus besides accumulated cash reserves and continuous revenue stream. Chines are the only one who have got it all at the moment......

The old sayings of my oldman-----"money makes money" and "money goes where money is" And "money is made by saving not earning"
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by heech »

And what about the long-discussed need to diversify China's foreign reserves, the great majority of which is currently denominated in dollars?

By buying Euro-denominated bonds (while selling dollars - or just buying fewer USTs), China will achieve exactly that.
Theo_Fidel

Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Theo_Fidel »

This should get the trolls swarming. :D

http://topics.scmp.com/news/china-news- ... ail-tracks

'Judgment day' fears for high-speed rail tracks
The breakneck speed at which track is being laid means engineers are likely to have to sacrifice quality for quantity on the lines' foundations which could ultimately halve their lifespan.

The problem lies in the use of high-quality fly ash, a fine powder chemically identical to volcanic ash, collected from the chimneys of coal-fired power plants. When mixed with cement and gravel, it can give the tracks' concrete base a lifespan of 100 years.

According to a study by the First Survey and Design Institute of China Railways in 2008, coal-fired power plants on the mainland could produce enough high-quality fly ash for the construction of 100 kilometres of high-speed railway tracks a year.

But more than 1,500 kilometres of track have been laid annually for the past five years. This year 4,500 kilometres of track will be laid with the completion of the world's longest high-speed railway line, between Beijing and Shanghai. Fly ash required for that 1,318-kilometre line would be more than that produced by all the coal-fired power plants in the world.

Enter low-quality fly ash.

Professor Wang Lan , lead scientist at the Cement and New Building Materials Research Institute under the China Building Materials Academy, said that given poor quality control on the mainland, the use of low-quality fly ash, and other low-grade construction materials, was "almost inevitable" in high-speed railway construction.

And that could have fatal consequences, Wang said. With a catalytic function almost opposite to that of good fly ash, the bad fly ash could significantly weaken railway line foundations and shorten a railway's lifespan by about half. That would mean China's high-speed rail tracks would last only 50 years.

But Zhu Ming - a researcher at Southwest Jiaotoing University's School of Civil Engineering who experimented with fly ash at a Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway construction site last year - was even more pessimistic.

The use of low-quality fly ash would threaten the safety of rail passengers and "judgment day" might come sooner than expected, Zhu said.

"Quality problems with Chinese high-speed railways will arise in five years," he said. "I'm not talking about small problems, but big problems. Small problems such as occasional cracks and slips that delay trains for hours have already occurred. Big problems that will postpone an entire line for days, if not weeks, will come soon.

"When that happens, the miracle of Chinese high-speed rail will be reduced to dust."

The 2008 study conducted by Yin Yaxiong , senior engineer at the First Survey and Design Institute of China Railways, concluded that though China produced more than 100 million tonnes of fly ash a year, only a small fraction of it would meet the quality requirements for high-speed rail construction.
Arriving at a railway construction site on the Guizhou-Guangxi border with a convoy of trucks carrying low-quality fly ash produced by a small coal-fired plant, the journalist said he saw the trucks drive directly to a cement mixing facility and unload straight into it.

"No sampling, no testing and no questions asked," the journalist said.

When that was completed, the convoy leader entered a building nearby with a bag of fly ash that he had in his pocket.

In the temporary building was a small laboratory and in the bag was high-quality fly ash. The man handed the laboratory clerk the bag for sampling - with an envelope containing a bribe - usually 10 to 20 per cent of the fly ash price, the journalist said.

Zhang Shuguan , deputy chief engineer for the Ministry of Railways, told Xinhua last month that the speeds on high-speed railways would reach 500km/h by 2050.

But Zhu said the average speed of trains on Chinese high-speed railways would probably decrease.

The system must endure the daily, if not hourly, grinding and twisting of heavily built passenger trains travelling at 350km/h, Zhu said.

Such operations would significantly speed up ageing of the railways. Some people had already urged that operations be slowed down to save the lines.

"We will need luck to maintain 250km/h for long." he said.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by vina »

Yawnn. In the "gleat peopur's lepubric" ..

Chinese Driver Sentenced to LIFE for evading tolls

And here we have a tarrel than mountain friends from the PRC explaining Peace and Prosperity due to the toll roads, and here we have somebody, whose toll charges were $550,000 for two years of driving a truck!.
But his punishment, life in prison and a $300,000 fine, has provoked a firestorm in the media and among Chinese who have accused the government of imposing a draconian sentence on a man trying to make ends meet in these inflationary days. “Rape and murder will earn you 15 years in prison but evading road charges will get you life,” said one typically cynical posting on Tianya, a popular message board. “Ours is a miraculous country with peculiar laws.”
With private car ownership soaring in China, the episode seems to have stoked mounting aversion to the tolls that have grown along with the nation’s rapidly expanding highway network
:lol: :lol:
A World Bank report in 2007 estimated that mile for mile, Chinese toll rates rivaled those in Germany, where incomes are far more extravagant.
:eek: :shock:
In 2008, the country’s National Audit Office said that motorists had handed over $2.3 billion at illegally erected tollbooths.
:rotfl:

And now of course, with high speed railways, which is lot more capital intensive than roadways, we have some magic numbers thrown about that the fares will be at a "China Price" and it will still make economic profits, while the roadways seem to have a "German Price" . Oh well. :roll:
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Bade »

motorists had handed over $2.3 billion at illegally erected tollbooths.

How can this be possible in a communist dictatorship with laws applied with a heavy hand. That is a loss of face for sure for the PRC guvermand. :D
One of the capital’s more unpopular highway tolls, for example, is the $1.50 charged for access to the 12-mile highway to Beijing’s international airport.
I have been told by a Beijing resident that most people would rather drag their luggage all the way using alternate routes than pay toll to use the highway for airport access. Dunno how far this is true, but looks like the rebellion has been going on for a long time, since I heard about it many years ago.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by DavidD »

Pratyush wrote:Chinese students eat roundworm eggs to look thin
Female students in China have been eating roundworm eggs to lose weight for job interviews - because employment is so hard to come by, a media report said. They hatch in the stomach, allowing those who take them to shed pounds without exercising or dieting in Xiamen, China. But swallowing the worms is extremely dangerous - and definitely not to be recommended for those wanting to shed the pounds in the New Year, reports Daily Mail.

With jobs shortages across the country, women in China are under pressure to appear thin if they are to have any chance of landing a role.

Employment stands at 22 % - and the size of the labour pool has grown by 112 million people over the last decade to more than one billion people.

Other students are staring at pictures for hours on end to suppress their appetite so they can shed excess weight.

A student called Xiaomei said that women are using a 'special soap' that helps them with their diets. Some are having up to 10 showers each day.

The treatments have no scientific basis and are likely to damage health.

In the 1990s Chinese women would take special teas and pills to lose weight. Acupuncture also emerged as a popular choice, the Mail reported.

But many students struggle to find work as the world's most populous nation faces big unemployment problems with only
780 million labourers in jobs.

However, the work problem is largely confined to rural areas. Jobs in cities are being created quickly as China undergoes a rapid urbanisation.

"China is facing huge employment pressures at present and for the foreseeable future," Yi Chengji, spokesman for the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security said.

"As China's urbanisation quickens, employment pressures from the many surplus rural labourers are getting bigger and bigger.

"Currently there are about 100 million surplus rural workers that need to be transferred (to urban jobs)."

What sort of roles require people to look thin???
Roundworm isn't a good idea, but eating some tapeworms is actually a fairly safe and effective way of reducing weight, IIRC.
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Post by DavidD »

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001 ... 58144.html
Economic growth in the last quarter of 2010 may have further moderated, and is estimated to rise at 9.3 percent from 9.6 percent in the third quarter.

For the whole year, China's gross domestic product is expected to settle at 10.2 percent, analysts said. The quarterly slowdown was largely due to a higher comparative base in 2009, and ever-tightening monetary policies by Beijing to tame inflation.

China's consumer price index jumped 5.1 percent in November, the most precipitous rise in 28 months. With food prices now stabilizing, December's CPI, the main gauge of inflation, may ease to 4.4 percent on an annual basis.
The GDP growth is continuing well, but inflation is still a problem. It'll be a focus of the Chinese government next year too for sure.
wig
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by wig »

this seems to be a strong point in the manufacturing saga of china = '80 pc of fake products in US originates from China'
Washington, Jan 14 Fake Chinese products are flooding the US market raising concerns among US officials, who are now proposing to run specialised training for Beijing Custom officials to check the menace.

"As much as 80 per cent of the fake products seized in the US are originating from China," US officials have said, adding that such large scale dumpings have been going on for the past five years.

So alarmed are the Americans that a top Homeland Security official said US had even run undercover operations to bust the fake smuggling lines.

"The majority of counterfeit seized products that we get do come from China. Roughly 80 per cent of what we seize in the US originates from China. It's just a fact. That's been the number for the last five years, roughly," said Richard Halverson, Unit Chief of the National Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Co-ordination Centre.
http://www.ptinews.com/news/1268310_-80 ... om-China--
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Post by Vipul »

China has $1.5 trillion in hidden debt: Lawmaker.

Billions of dollars of debt racked up by local Chinese governments during their investment sprees are likely to sour as the projects they finance near completion, Yin Zhongqing, a prominent Chinese lawmaker, said this week.

In an interview with Reuters Insider, Yin said local governments had incurred at least 10 trillion yuan ($1.5 trillion) of "hidden" debt, which they have concealed by creating thousands of investment vehicles that serve as borrowers.

Yin said it is not yet clear which loans will sour because they do not have to be repaid until the projects are completed.

"The large amount of debt that local governments took on since the end of 2008 to battle the impact of the global financial crisis will become a heavy burden for our development going forward," said Yin, who is a member of the finance and economic affairs committee in China's parliament.

He highlighted the high risk of default in the low-level county governments, which Yin said have little financial resources.

"Seventy percent of the loans from these investment and financing platforms in 2009 and 2010 were generated at the county level, where governments don't have much assets, and some cannot even afford to pay their staff," he said.

"Debts accumulated from these platforms, even with government financial guarantees, simply cannot be paid back. In other words, when they borrowed the money, local governments did not plan to pay it back."

Local Chinese governments are barred by law from borrowing directly. To pay for their ambitious growth plans for cities, they set up investment vehicles that take out bank loans backed by assets, typically land, or implicit government guarantees.

They do not show up in official central government debt accounts. But Yin said these debts will ultimately have to be written off by Chinese banks and Beijing. "In 2009 and 2010, we encouraged them (local governments) to increase debt and run deficits to stimulate investment. Local governments' debt problems will come to light in 2011," Yin said.

He said local Chinese governments were still pursuing breakneck growth rates despite pleas from Beijing to slow down to let the economy tread a more steady and sustainable path. "We need to use macro controls to pull it back and lower it to a reasonable level," Yin said.

While the problem of "hidden" debt among local governments is not new to China, its massive three-year stimulus programme in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis exacerbated the issue. China's bank regulator estimated last year that local governments have racked up 7.66 trillion yuan in debt as of June 2010, of which 26 percent is unlikely to be repaid.

But the regulator put a brave face on the problem by saying the risks are under control since most loans can eventually be repaid using income earned from their investment. It also said banks are well protected against defaults because they have already set aside adequate provisions.

Yin warned against complacency, however, and said China's debt ratio was much higher than what official data suggests. Beijing has said its fiscal deficit will fall below 2.2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2010, while its total debt will be less than 20 percent of GDP.

"China's rapid development has covered up many problems. But once economic growth slows down, these problems will emerge as stones rise when water levels fall," Yin said.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by ravar »

A sudden outpour about existence of warts among Chinese and that too as revealed by honchos of state institutions (railway official quoting himself- "high-speed rail will be reduced to dust") and CPC apparatchiks (about impending/possible financial meltdown)!

What gives?

Until now, wasn't everything hunky dory and picture perfect as per Mao's Li'l Red Book?
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Post by zlin »

China’s Galloping Wind Market
corporation that makes wind-machine components estimates that more than three times as much wind power capacity was installed in China last year than in the United States and that China now constitutes the world’s largest wind energy market.

The report, from the American Superconductor Corporation, which makes wind machine components and licenses other companies to produce such components, said that China might have the largest installed base of wind turbines, about 40,000 megawatts.

The United States ended the third quarter of last year with about 36,700 megawatts of installed capacity, and with a year-end slowdown, may have ended the year with less than 40,000 megawatts.

In 2010 China installed about 16,000 megawatts, versus 5,000 in the United States; in 2009 it installed 13,000 megawatts versus 10,000 in the United States, according to American Superconductor.

The wind picture is part of a trend; China is also adding coal-fired power plants and nuclear plants very rapidly to meet a sharply increasing demand for electricity. The United States, with a more mature economy, a recession and growing energy efficiency, is thought to have seen modest growth in electricity demand last year by comparison with 2009, but remains significantly below its peak electric demand because of the recession.

American Superconductor, which is based in Devens, Mass., also announced on Tuesday that it had licensed some of its proprietary designs to a sixth Chinese company, the Jingcheng New Energy Company. Jincheng has been producing wind turbines since 2006, it said, and can now produce 2,000 megawatts per year.

American Superconductor had components in 25 percent of Chinese wind turbines in 2009 and says the proportion was at least that high in 2010. Two of the Chinese customers to which it licenses designs are among the top 10 wind companies in the world, Sinovel and Dongfang.

For comparison’s sake, here is a midyear graph prepared in 2010 by the World Wind Energy Association:
Image
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Post by zlin »

Haier Tops Global Appliances Rankings Again
By Marie Jones | Monday | 13/12/2010


The Haier Group, the parent company of Haier Australia which is the number one manufacturer of refrigeration appliances in the world, has topped the global major appliances rankings for 2010 for the second year running with a 6.1 percent market share.
The international ranking is awarded by UK-based Euromonitor International, which is the world's leading independent provider of business intelligence on industries, countries and consumers.

The Haier Group has extended its global brand market share ranking by almost 20 percent since last year, and in Australia, appeals generally to Gen Y customers who are drawn to the company's contemporary styling and functionality of the products.

It leads Euromonitor International's ranking in three product categories: Refrigeration Appliances, Home Laundry and Electrical Wine Cooler/Chiller Appliances.

In each category, the company has increased its market share. In the refrigeration sector, it leads the world with a 12.5 percent retail volume share, and it has a 9.1 percent retail volume share in home laundry appliances.

Richard Bowe, Haier Australia's General Manager, said: "Haier's number one position on this respected index for the second year proves the growing respect and demand for Haier's innovative range of products, and affirms our confidence in a strong future for the brand in the Australian market."

"Haier continues to raise the bar in its commitment to design and manufacture of stylish but affordable appliances that combine reliability with the very latest technology.

"Our proposition is that Haier's competitive pricing leaves [Gen Y] consumers with enough money left in their pocket to spend on the things in life that make them happy, such as concert tickets or new shoes," said Bowe.
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Post by wig »

the telegraph of Uk has an interesting article = with figures= that paint a less than rosy picture
- of course these are the opinions of hedge funds not the chinese govt.

Hedge funds bet China is a bubble close to bursting

The world is looking to China as a springboard out of recession - but some hedge funds are betting the country's credit and growth levels cannot be sustained.
The manager, who wanted to remain anonymous, said: “The Chinese delegation has said all week that there will be double-digit growth for years to come and the Brits have lapped it up. But the data doesn’t add up. We think we’ve experienced credit bubbles over the past few years, but China is the biggest. And yet the global economy is looking to China as not just a crutch but a springboard out of the recession. It’s crazy.” The Mayfair hedge fund manager said he started work when he saw some news reports on China’s “ghost towns”. Last year Al Jazeera, the Middle Eastern television channel, aired a short report from Ordos Shi, a city in inner Mongolia built for one million people that is almost entirely empty. The report reveals empty streets, housing estates, shops and restaurants. The locals prefer the old town of Ordos and tell the cameras there’s no need to move to the new city.

According to Corriente, China has consumed just 65pc of the cement it has produced in five years, after exports. The country is outputting more steel than the world’s next seven largest producers combined. It has 200m tons of excess capacity.

In property, Corriente said it had found an excess of 3.3bn square metres of floor space in China – yet 200m square metres of new space is being constructed each year.

Despite the vast population, the property is generally out of the price range for most. House prices are around 22 times disposable income in Beijing. The IMF has said that house prices in eastern cities have become “increasingly disconnected from the fundamentals” but so far has said there is no nationwide bubble.

Professor Victor Shih of Northwestern University, Illinois, estimates that Chinese banks have lent $1.7 trillion (£1.1 trillion) to local state entities, many of which are not commercially viable and have used inflated land values as collateral.

Experts in China dismiss the hedge funds’ arguments as narrow and exaggerated. The Chinese government has implemented policy measures to curb credit and control inflation. Above all, they argue that China’s huge and modernizing population will fuel demand for years.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/econ ... sting.html
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by wig »

vina wrote:Yawnn. In the "gleat peopur's lepubric" ..

Chinese Driver Sentenced to LIFE for evading tolls

And here we have a tarrel than mountain friends from the PRC explaining Peace and Prosperity due to the toll roads, and here we have somebody, whose toll charges were $550,000 for two years of driving a truck!.
But his punishment, life in prison and a $300,000 fine, has provoked a firestorm in the media and among Chinese who have accused the government of imposing a draconian sentence on a man trying to make ends meet in these inflationary days. “Rape and murder will earn you 15 years in prison but evading road charges will get you life,” said one typically cynical posting on Tianya, a popular message board. “Ours is a miraculous country with peculiar laws.”
the curious aspect is that this here toll avoider does not seem to have any other form of redressal in the chinese legal system. what is required is an all round hullabaloo for any body in power to think of reducing the ridiculous sentence.
contrast that with any country with a legal framework. an accused would have four to five levels of appellate courts to agitate his case against the dept which penalised you in the first place. does'nt paint a nice picture of the fairness of the chinese legal framework.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by zlin »

Jumbo Chinese onions to ease crisis?
Vijay Singh, TNN, Jan 15, 2011, 02.08am IST
MUMBAI: The last of the imported stocks of onions, this time from China, arrived at the APMC wholesale market in Vashi on Friday. The Chinese onions are high grade and double the size of normal Indian onions.

The director of onion-potato section of APMC, Ashok Valunj, said: ''A shipping container with 11 tonnes of imported onions of China arrived today from Nhava Sheva. We will not be getting any more imports from Pakistan or China now, as the fresh farm supplies from Pune and Nashik belt will now start flooding the markets.''

He said the wholesale onions prices are steadily on the decline due to ample supplies at wholesale markets all over Maharashtra.

On Friday, there were arrivals of 110 truckloads of onions at the Vashi APMC. This further reduced the rates in the range of Rs 20 to Rs 32 per kg. The high-quality Chinese onions went for the higher rate of Rs 32 per kg.

Onion trader Sanjay Parakh said the Chinese onions are quite big and heavy, weighing between 250 gm and 300 gm per piece.

Comparatively, a normal grade Indian or Pakistani onion weighs only between 100 gm to 150 gm. This makes the Chinese bulb double the size of Indian onions.


Read more: Jumbo Chinese onions to ease crisis? - The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... z1BEqgrPjj
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Post by RamaT »

China Could Game the U.S. in Intellectual Property
The Times is right about China's intellectual-property ambitions. China achieved the same feat in academic research, where it is now second only to the U.S. in the number of academic papers published—and is positioned to overtake the U.S. by 2020. But The Times' conclusion is flawed: Patents will neither make China more innovative nor will they benefit the global economy. A vast number of China's academic papers are plagiarized or irrelevant; its government-sponsored patents will be similarly tainted. In contrast to the tiny proportion of academic papers that serve to expand the world's knowledge base, however, Chinese patents will serve as land mines for foreign businesses. They will allow China to demand license fees from companies that do business there or to shut them out entirely.

Many in the tech industry, myself included, consider most U.S. patents commercially frivolous and irrelevant. But as The Economist has reported, this problem is far worse in China, where patent examiners are paid more if they approve more patents. They routinely approve even the most dubious filings. And Chinese academics, companies, and individuals have strong incentives to patent worthless ideas: With more patent filings, professors gain tenure, workers and students gain residence permits to live in a desirable cities, corporate income tax is reduced from 25% to 15%, and companies win lucrative government contracts. The reward doesn't come from innovation, but from the act of filing a patent application.
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/ ... 509416.htm
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Post by RamaT »

China’s Grey Swan is changing colors
The Chinese economy is heading toward an economic hard landing; it will overshoot to the downside and become the economic Black Swan event of 2011-2012. Inflation, yes both types, will be the story in China in the coming months.
The Chinese are going to be shopping the worlds markets for any available coal with BTU content higher than their own average domestic coal. They have no choices. They are going to be buying coal from the US east coast terminals in size before this is over.
The need to import high-grade coal ore & iron ore are the two Achilles heel of their export based economy. China is going to be pushing up coal prices around the world, making locally sourced steel profitable again in the US.
In simple terms, there are two types of inflation.
There is cost push inflation where a producer is able to increase prices, because of an increase in raw costs.
There is the expectation of inflation type. This is the source of all past hyperinflationary events!
The second type is the dangerous type. Expectations of inflation infected the US economy when Paul Volcker took charge of the US Federal Reserve. He raised interest rates in the US, until he killed the expectation that there would inflation. It was a gutsy call at the time, and is what provided the fuel for the historic bull market of 1982 -2000 to grow.
Once it’s infected a nation’s population, it does not go silently away. It takes Volcker type actions to stop it dead in its tracks. To do that, China would have to put their economy into a negative growth period, something they can’t afford to do.
http://www.businessinsider.com/chinas-g ... ors-2011-1
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by Hari Seldon »

^^^ All these noises made about hard landings for china are suspect, IMHO. We'll believe it when we see it. If the Chinese manage to transition to internal consumption i time, they can be spared the ominous pronouncements. Hecvk, even I am becoming an economic optimist these days.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by RamaT »

Worthless Stocks from China
When a retiree in Texas discovered that some Chinese companies listed in the U.S. are frauds, he unleashed an army of short-sellers
Sky One, Bird would find, wasn't the only stock recently arrived from China, and it wasn't the only one seemingly exceeding financial speed limits. Sky One, which declined to comment for this story, is one of more than 350 small Chinese companies to have listed in the U.S. since 2004 through a process called a reverse merger, in which an operating Chinese company takes over an all-but-defunct publicly traded U.S. shell company.
Bird's involvement would evolve from irritation that a company could get away with making a claim that so obviously defies basic business logic to the conviction that many pieces of the Chinese miracle that trade in the U.S. are, in his words, "flat-ass" frauds. And what started as a retiree looking into a company has turned into a dispute that has drawn in other shorts, the Securities and Exchange Commission, auditors, and, according to recent reports, the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services. It has also revealed significant flaws in U.S. markets and how they are regulated. Although the stocks trade on U.S. exchanges, and thus project a sense of having to play by American rules, the assets and the principals of many of the companies reside in China. The companies operate on their terms, leaving injured parties and the SEC powerless. Bird says the carnage is just beginning. "The whole thing has no place to go but to blow up," he says. "That's a rational position for an investor to start with, that every one of these Chinese reverse mergers is a fraud."
Like many U.S.-listed Chinese companies, Orient Paper was underwritten by Roth Capital, which responded to the short attacks with a primer that aimed to explain the SAIC filings. "Divergent PRC [People's Republic of China] filings and U.S. filings do not, in and of themselves, establish error, misstatement, or fraud," researchers John Ma and Mark Tobin wrote in a July 2010 report. "This data should be viewed as one aspect of a broader due diligence process."
:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:
A couple of days later, governance research firm Audit Integrity, which rates almost 20,000 public companies, warned U.S. investors about Chinese stocks listed in the U.S. Its system for scoring companies on 100 different accounting and governance metrics had been turning up poor ratings, often a sign that companies are manipulating their numbers, says Audit Integrity's chairman, James A. Kaplan. "I noticed this issue well over a year ago," he says. "But in all candor, no one cared because of the brand of China. China was flying high. If it was branded as a Chinese company, it must mean it was going to be good and make money."

"As these companies are scrutinized, investors will uncover the facts behind the 'Chinese Curtain,' " Kaplan wrote in a Dec. 3 report. "Many of these stocks may prove to be valueless."

8) Big opportunity for BRFites and friends to make $$ and short these crap stocks back to China. 8)

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/co ... 566865.htm
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by jamwal »

DavidD wrote:
Roundworm isn't a good idea, but eating some tapeworms is actually a fairly safe and effective way of reducing weight, IIRC.

You're a medical student ..right ? :shock:
One of my friend's relatives had a tapeworm infection. The worm reached his brain and had to be surgically removed,
I never believed when some people said Chinese will eat anything.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by sampat »

China banks lend more than World Bank - report
The China Development Bank and the China Export Import Bank offered loans of at least $110 bn (£69.2 bn) to governments and firms in developing countries in 2009 and 2010.

The research was undertaken by the Financial Times newspaper.

Between mid-2008 and mid-2010, the World Bank's lending arm issued loans of just over $100 billion(£63bn).

The two Chinese banks do not publish a detailed breakdown of their overseas loans, so this research is based on public announcements about specific deals from them, their borrowers or the Chinese government.

That means the figure arrived at for the amount of Chinese lending is more likely an underestimate than an overestimate because some - more sensitive - loans will not have been made public.

The Chinese lenders are so-called policy banks - they have a mandate to further whatever Beijing sees as its national interest.

One of China Development Bank's specific tasks is to try to alleviate and, where possible, eliminate bottlenecks in supplies of raw materials or land for China's economy.

It also tries to open up foreign markets for Chinese companies.

The period looked at by the researchers included the worst of the global financial crisis.

Some investments overseas face problems - as in a recent shooting at a Zambian mine

Chinese banks were offering loans to producers of raw materials at a time when it was hard for them to attract financing from elsewhere.

That helped secure long-term energy deals, including oil supplies from Russia, Venezuela and Brazil.

The Chinese government, which is sitting on $2 trillion (£1.26 trillion) of foreign exchange reserves, has ample amounts of cash to fund loans which help promote its strategic objectives.

But what is interesting is that in the private sector, it is a different story.

Outward Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) by Chinese companies (not including banks) was around $50bn (£31.5bn) last year - around half the FDI that flowed from foreign companies into China.

This is the world's second-largest economy but its outward flow of FDI is just the fifth largest in the world.

That suggests that Chinese companies still do not have the confidence to make big acquisitions overseas in order to grow, or of course that they are unable to.

What does not help is the sometimes murky relationship between the government and some of the country's biggest firms which can make the targets of such acquistions or potential merger partners nervous about doing deals with the Chinese.
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

Post by DavidD »

jamwal wrote:
DavidD wrote:
Roundworm isn't a good idea, but eating some tapeworms is actually a fairly safe and effective way of reducing weight, IIRC.

You're a medical student ..right ? :shock:
One of my friend's relatives had a tapeworm infection. The worm reached his brain and had to be surgically removed,
I never believed when some people said Chinese will eat anything.
That's probably a pig tapeworm(Taenia solium), cow tapeworm(Taenia saginata) is pretty harmless. That was actually one of the test questions I had not so long ago, both pig and cow tapeworms were choices. You know, I actually thought about clarifying that, but I didn't think anybody on the board would care about the differences! So yeah, don't ever eat pig tapeworm, cysterci in the brain are bad stuff! Oh, and it's not just the Chinese who've tried this, check this pic I got from my lecture slides:
Image
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Re: PRC Economy and Industry: News and Discussions

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