China in Africa – Part 2/2

November 29, 2010

Richard Behar, the American reporter, starts out by answering a question from an e-mail that came in about sweatshop, slave labor in Africa. 

Behar says that African consumers can buy cheap goods—that’s the good news.

The bad news is that most developing countries need light manufacturing industries such as textiles to develop, and China is making that almost impossible for African countries.

Riz Khan turns to Dr. John Afele and mentions something Behar wrote in China Storms Africa that claims what China is doing is a replay of imperial colonialism.

Dr. Afele says he sees this as an economic situation and if it is economic, than Thomas Friedman, the author of The World is Flat, is right that economics is not like war and can be a win-win situation.

This is not a time when Africa has no voice, Afele says. This time the world is watching so I do not think we are going back to an era of colonialism. There are international organizations to help that didn’t exist during colonialism.

Then Khan turns to David Shinn, the former US ambassador to Ethiopia, who is now a professor at George Washington University. The question has to do with countries like America that are reluctant to do business in Africa due to Africa’s negative international image.

Shinn replies that the perception of Africa for American businesses is negative. However, he does not think China is bothered by that image.

Referring to Behar’s claims of colonialism rearing its ugly head, Shinn says this infers political control and that is not part of today’s equation. Colonialism is not happening.

Turning back to Behar, Khan brings up the perception of corruption of businesses in China.

Behar uses Mozambique as an example saying that within five years the best wood will be gone as the trees are cut down. He says the same thing is going on in the Congo with copper. (I ask, How is this corruption?)

Shinn responds by saying the upside (or win-win situation Afele mentioned) is that China offers Africa long term, low interest loans that were only being offered by the West with political strings attached.

China doesn’t make the same demands the West does.  (What no one said is that China was also a victim of colonialism for more than a century starting with the Opium Wars.)

Return to China in Africa – Part 1

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

China in Africa – Part 1/2

November 28, 2010

Al Jazerra explores topics about China seldom heard in the Western Media. Riz Khan, the host of this program, moderates a panel of global experts discussing China’s role in Africa.

If this is a topic that interests you, I suggest you read Leopold’s Ghost by Adam Hochschild for a balance and comparison.

Khan says that between 1998 and 2006, Africa’s exports to China increased 2,126% while exports only increased 139% to the European Union and 402% to the US.

Due to China’s incredible modernization growth rate, China has become dependent on resources from Africa, South America, Australia and Southeast Asia.

Some critics, which is to be expected, complain that China is robbing Africa of its natural resources and ignoring human rights violations and other humanitarian concerns.

However, supporters say that due to this trade with China, economies in Sub-Saharan Africa have grown an average of six percent a year since 2004.

Khan’s program explores if China is exploiting Africa or creating opportunities for economic growth.

Khan’s guests are Richard Behar, an American reporter, who wrote China Storms Africa. He says China is doing both good and bad at this time, and there is no way to predict the outcome. He feels China is copying what the West already did.

From Brussels comes Dr. John Afele, author of Digital Bridges, Developing Countries in the Knowledge Economy. 

Dr. Afele says there is a difference. African governments opened to China. China did not invade Africa as the West did in the 19th and 20th centuries. China was invited in.

From Washington D.C. comes David Shinn, a former US ambassador to Ethiopia, who is now a professor at George Washington University.

Shinn says the US buys more oil from Africa but China buys more minerals and hardwood timber. All of the major players in Africa have the same interests—resource extraction and selling goods to Africans.

Juliana, a caller from Paris, asked, “Why is China being demonized?” She mentions that all Western countries did this. She points out that the differences are that China’s interests are for good because China’s focus is to invest in Africa.

Richard Behar replies that no one is demonizing China here.

Then Behar spends time criticizing China by slipping in the standard complaints from a Westerner’s point of view.

I suggest you learn more about Oil and Death in Africa to discover more on this topic.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

China Going Vertical

November 26, 2010

About three decades ago, most of China’s cities were horizontal and the vast majority of China’s population lived in rural areas.

Today, more than 500 million live in China’s modern, vertical cities.  Even in 1999, the first time I visited Shanghai, much of the city was horizontal.  Today, Shanghai has over 4,000 high-rises with more being built all the time.

This is how China is providing homes for its huge population.

What caused me to think about this was a piece from Reuters about a recent 28-story high-rise fire in an apartment block in Shanghai that killed 42. Fifty more were taken to a nearby hospital.  Even the hospitals in Shanghai are vertical.

Since China has only been going vertical for the last three decades, this is a new type of tragedy for China.

Reading about the fire brought back memories of The Towering Inferno, a film from 1974 starring Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, William Holden and a host of other well-known actors of the time.

According to the National Fire Protection Association in the United States, between 1985 and 2002, 1,600 civilians died and over 20,000 were injured in about 385,000 high-rise building fires in the United States, excluding the MGM Grand Hotel and the Las Vegas Hilton fires in the early 80’s, and the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

The high-rise fire at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas claimed 87 lives.

With China building so many high rises there will be more fires, and fatalities may even match or exceed America’s history of high-rise fires.

What I find interesting is this—with thousands of high-rise fires in the US annually, why haven’t we heard about them?  Yet, when one fire hits a high rise in Shanghai, news of it spreads across the global immediately.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Tiger Woods smiles big while golfing in China

November 21, 2010

Lisa Mason shows a gallery of photos of Tiger Woods smiling big at the WGC-HSBC Champions at Sheshan International Gold Club in Shanghai, China on November 3, 2010.

She says, “He looks truly happy in these photos. Maybe he is finding some happiness again.”

China is building golf courses and China’s growing middle class is taking up golf.

The Golf Travel Gurusays that Hainan Island in the South China Sea is China’s answer to Hawaii and is one of Asia’s finest golfing destinations, with several world-class courses.

Golf Todaysays the first thing one notices about golf in China – after marveling at the game’s sudden popularity – is how many players seem to have decent swings.

In fact, Golf Today says, golf is the latest fashion in Beijing and it is estimated there are 100,000 golfers in China.  “The number should double in five years,” T. K. Pen, a Taiwanese-American investor says.

Meanwhile, officials in China are being careful. Golf Today says there are so manygolf courses in China the government is losing count.

Golf courses take up a lot of land. With more than 1.3 billion people to feed, the central government has declared a moratorium on course construction.

However, Slate says, “Almost all of the nation’s 600 or so completed golf courses are illegal in some way.”

Since China grows food on about 10% of its land, turning croplands into golf courses may not be the best way to make a profit.

Discover the Winemaker from Shanxi Province to learn how others are using farmland in China.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of My Splendid Concubine [3rd edition]. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the lusty love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.

#1 - Joanna Daneman review posted June 19 2014

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Tiger Trade leads to Guilin in Southeast China

November 20, 2010

Every country has poorly written laws with loopholes that allow industrious entrepreneurs to make money anyway possible.

Exploiting wild animals is one way to make that money.

In May 2003, the San Diego Wild Animal Park in the U.S. came under intense criticism from animal welfare groups…

In February 1999, the San Jose Mercury News published a series of articles by Linda Goldstein entitled “Zoo Animals to Go”.

Goldstein alleged that major U.S. zoos in the United States purposely over breed some animals to produce babies that are popular with the public and bring in crowds. Older and less popular animals are quietly discarded and often end up at rundown roadside zoos and exotic animal auctions.

Unwanted but healthy animals were euthanized at the Detroit Zoo during the 1990s, and a handful of dealers preferred by the major zoos have become wealthy from the sales of unwanted exotics given or sold to them by the zoos, Goldstein claimed. Source: Entertainment Animals – Zoos

In China, animal welfare activists allege that a wildlife park in southeast China has been farming tigers.

Al Jazeera’s Tony Birtley reported from Guilin that the tigers are declawed and defanged and threatened with sticks to perform tricks for audiences.

The Guilin tiger park claims it is a research establishment devoted to the welfare and survival of the big cat.

However, Chinese animal welfare activists claim that this is nothing more than a farm producing tigers for their valuable body parts.

Hua Ning of International Fund for Animal Welfare says people hear about these farms and think that the tigers will not perish. She says the truth is this park has about 1,500 tigers and many are abused.

Birtley says that killing tigers in China is illegal and offenders face stiff jail terms.

However, allowing tigers to die from starvation and neglect is not technically killing. That is the loophole in China’s law that critics say is being exploited at this wildlife park in Guilin.

The reality is that tigers are worth more dead than alive.

There are only a few hundred tigers at this park on display for visitors. Birtley was told the rest were used for research in a large section of the park closed to the public.

One product this park sells is wine made from tiger bones. One bottle may sell for $250 dollars.

Traditional Chinese medicine uses all parts of the tiger, but the bones are the most valuable part of the animal. It is believed these bones prolong life, cure rheumatism, arthritis and solve sexual problems.

Twenty-five kilos (55.1 pounds) of tiger bones will make enough wine to earn $300 thousand dollars.

Meanwhile, China’s government has urged zoos to stop serving wild animal products and holding wildlife performances in an attempt to improve the treatment of tigers, bears and other animals amid concerns over widespread abuse in zoos and wildlife parks. Source: Animal News

Discover China’s Tea Horse Road

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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