From the Financial Times (link) China’s premier on Wednesday pledged a wide-ranging package of economic aid to south Pacific island allies, including Rmb3bn ($375m) in preferential loans. The pledge made by Wen Jiabao was seen by analysts as a bid to isolate Taiwan and cement Beijing’s influence in the region. In the first visit by […]
Read MoreFrom The Southern Weekend (in Chinese), via Press Interpreter, translated by Ramsi Woodcock: On New Year’s eve 2006, 23 year old Xu Ping, a female village school teacher, looked around the table full of family members. Xu Enhuai looked at the unusually mature face of his daughter and said something of deep significance to his […]
Read MoreFrom China Confidential blog (link): The annual session of China’s rubber stamp parliament started Sunday, and a new reform plan for the troubled countryside was at the top of the agenda. The plan, which aims to create “a socialist countryside,” is the centerpiece of China’s next five-year plan, which the so-called parliament–officially known as the […]
Read MoreThe following was posted on Soho Xiaobao BBS (link) (translation by CDT): This is a collection of twenty independent reports of real cases [of suicide resulting from inability to pay school fees]. Every year, from July to...
Read MoreFrom Forbes.com (link): China’s State Council said it will allow private and foreign firms to buy stakes in rural financial institutions, as Beijing turns its attention to its most debt-ladened and politically sensitive lenders. The country’s cabinet said in a statement that rural financial institutions at county level will be able to diversify their ownership […]
Read MoreBelow is China analyst David Cowhig’s translation of a chapter from Zhou Tianyong’s Breaking Through the Obstacles to Development (Á™ÅÁ†¥Âèë±ïÁöщΩìÂà∂ÊÄßÈöúÁ¢ç). This book was mentioned in Beijing takes on local-government mafias from Asia Times: Over the past several years, peasant incomes have slowly increased but consumption in rural China has been weak. While on the macroeconomic […]
Read MoreFrom Bloomberg, via the Vancouver Sun: From his 16th-floor office on Beijing’s Avenue of Eternal Peace, distressed-debt specialist Jack Rodman has a grandstand view of the $160-billion US worth of construction that will add the equivalent of three Manhattans to the skyline by 2008, when China’s capital will host the Olympic Games. To the east, […]
Read MoreFrom Spiegel Online: Central government planners are worried. They want to steady the economy in the bellwether city at all costs — for fear of an impending crash. Such a meltdown could spark unforeseen consequences, and deal a crushing blow to state banks that have amassed billions in distressed debt. To ward off the apocalypse, […]
Read MoreFrom NPR.org: If you think the costs of war in Iraq and recovery from Hurricane Katrina will force President Bush to raise taxes, think again. No matter how high the price may go for rebuilding the Gulf Coast while staying the course in the Persian Gulf, this White House will not choose the revenue option… […]
Read MoreFrom Reuters: Chinese President Hu Jintao offered the world’s poorest countries tariff-free trade, debt relief and cheap loans on Wednesday — but excluded about a dozen states which recognize China’s rival Taiwan. Hu used his speech at a United Nations summit to underscore fast-growing China’s support for the developing world, calling on rich countries to […]
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