[China’s]…economy has gone from being rather smaller than Italy’s to the world’s second largest, and is now home to one million US$ millionaires. By the time the new generation of leaders hands over power to the next in 2022, China could be challenging the US for top spot.
This transformation has changed the way the world does business. Cheap Chinese labour has helped dampen prices in the West for everything from moccasins to mops to mobile phones. It is now the biggest investor in Africa, promising to shift the continent’s focus away from Europe and the US for the first time in two centuries. And China is now the biggest foreign holder of US government debt – a threatening stick, or a foolhardy bet?
The key question now is whether the new leaders can keep the economy growing at the same rate as in the past, and help the rest of the world recover. Most Western analysts expect it to slow from 10% a year to a still impressive 6-7%, but argue that deep reforms are needed if China is to become a rich rather than middle-income country.
A funny anecdote that illustrates just how influential China is becoming in West Africa….
I’ve been working in West Africa for 20 years. For most of that time, I ,an American Caucasian female, have been called two names by young children playing on the street who want to taunt me because I’m a foreigner.
The first name, by Arabic speaking children, is “Nasraniya” (an Arabic word derived from Nazarene, meaning Christian, and in the local context applied somewhat derisively to any white foreigner.)
The second word, is Toubab, a Wolof word, meaning white person
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toubab)
But now increasingly, as I walk in the shanty towns of poor neighborhoods, the children are crying out “Chinois, Chinois” (the French pronunciation for Chinese)!
A pretty telling anecdote, as is the fact that the new local Chinese embassy here is MASSIVE. It dwarfs the US or French embassies and is also a bit larger than the nearby EU headquarters.
Be careful, or the next Chevy you buy might be designed and built in China.