Xi Jinping By John Richardson THE good health of China’s economy and the future of the Communist Party depend on giving farmers individual land-ownership rights and allowing equal rights for migrants in cities, an official from a leading Beijing-based government think tank told Bloomberg in this article. “Land and hukou reform is the cornerstone […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Without The Benefit Of Time
Victorian Britain (Source of picture: Wikimedia) By John Richardson LIFE in China can be grim, much as it was in Britain during its industrial development. In China, according to The Economist: A tenth of the country’s […]
The Great Polyethylene Mystery Hunt Continues
By John Richardson REPORTS of soaring apparent polyethylene (PE) demand (imports plus domestic production) in China continue as the search also persists for an explanation, given the country’s weak macro-economic environment. Last week we wrote of a 13% increase in demand in January-June of this year compared with the same months in 2011, based on data […]
China PE Demand Boosted By New Environmental Clampdown On Recycling
By John Richardson BACK in 2009, virgin polyolefins demand growth in China was boosted by a sharp drop in imports of recycled or scrap plastic resulting from tougher enforcement of environmental regulations. Now another government crackdown on imports of scrap material, again due to environmental concerns, might have provided a further benefit to demand growth for […]
More Great News On China
Pollution over eastern China Source of picture: Wikimedia By John Richardson IT wasn’t the kind of news that China’s polyethylene (PE) traders wanted to reflect on over the weekend. On Friday, China’s cabinet – the State Council – announced that it had adopted 10 measures designed to improve air quality. “Many of the measures […]
A Delicate Balancing Act
XI Jinping (see picture), the country’s new president, is being described either as a nationalist, who has set China on an overly aggressive course or as someone who will skilfully and harmoniously guide the nation through major domestic and international reforms. According to Robert Lawrence Kuhn , an international investment banker and author, Xi’s nationalism, or […]
China’s Auto Sales Challenge
By John Richardson THE assumption behind big investments in auto capacity in China – and in butadiene, synthetic rubber, polypropylene (PP) and other chemicals and polymer capacities linked to the auto industry – is that, eventually, Western levels of car ownership will be achieved. But Hou Yankun, head of China Equity Research and head of […]
Everything Is Going To Plan
By John Richardson So far so good – everything is going to plan. The flash Markit/HSBC China Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for May fell to 49.6, slipping under the 50-point level demarcating expansion from contraction for the first since October last year and sending Asian financial markets sharply lower. But, crucially, as Reuters pointed out in this article, […]
China Will Do What Suits China
By John Richardson CHINA might well be in the midst of deflation caused by overcapacity in some chemicals, and in many other industries as well, but the longer-term strategic direction of reducing dependence on imports doesn’t appear to have changed. An indication of this was this story from my colleague Lilian Hua at ICIS. She […]
Sinopec And The Blog’s Favourite Triangle
By John Richardson ONE of Sinopec’s subsidiaries, Shanghai Petrochemical, has weighed-in to the debate over US shale gas by warning that cheap petrochemicals imports from the States could erode the whole of China’s competitiveness. “We can’t tell how severe the blow will be, but it will pose a serious challenge, and the entire industry will […]
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