The march of the zombies
China’s excess industrial capacity harms its economy and riles its trading partners
“OVERSUPPLY is a global problem and a global problem requires collaborative efforts by all countries.” Those defiant words were uttered by Gao Hucheng, China’s minister of commerce, at a press conference held on February 23rd in Beijing. Mr Gao was responding to the worldwide backlash against the rising tide of Chinese industrial exports, by suggesting that everyone is to blame.
1 march 齐步走;行进2 excess |ɪkˈses| 超过过度过分3 rile |raɪl| 惹恼,激怒 4 defiant |dɪˈfaɪənt| 公然违抗的;反抗的;挑衅的5 tide 浪潮,潮流,势头 6 utter [ˈʌtə(r)] 出声,说,讲
Oversupply is indeed a global problem, but not quite in the way Mr Gao implies. China’s huge exports of industrial goods are flooding markets everywhere, contributing to deflationary pressures and threatening producers worldwide. If this oversupply were broadly the result of capacity gluts in many countries, then Mr Gao would be right that China should not be singled out. But this is not the case.
1 deflationary 通货紧缩的 2capacity gluts 产能过剩 3 gult 供应过剩;供过于求 4 single out 单独挑出 5 broadly 大体上;基本上;不考虑细节地 generally
China’s surplus capacity in steelmaking, for example, is bigger than the entire steel production of Japan, America and Germany combined. Rhodium Group, a consulting firm, calculates that global steel production rose by 57% in the decade to 2014, with Chinese mills making up 91% of this increase. In industry after industry, from paper to ships to glass, the picture is the same: China now has far too much supply in the face of shrinking internal demand. Yet still the expansion continues: China’s aluminium-smelting capacity is set to rise by another tenth this year. According to Ying Wang of Fitch, a credit-rating agency, around two billion tonnes of gross new capacity in coal mining will open in China in the next two years.
1 surplus capacity 过剩产能 2 mill 工厂;制造厂 3 aluminium [ˌæljəˈmɪniəm] 4 smelt 熔炼,提炼金属 Ying Wang王颖
Fitch 惠誉 高级董事 Rhodium rəʊdiəm Group 荣鼎集团 (铑)
1913年,惠誉国际由约翰·惠誉(John K.Fitch)创办,惠誉评级是与标普、穆迪齐名的全球三大评级公司之一。在三大评级公司里,惠誉是最早进入中国的。
A detailed report released this week by the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China reveals that industrial overcapacity has surged since 2008 . China’s central bank recently surveyed 696 industrial firms in Jiangsu, a coastal province full of factories, and found that capacity utilisation had “decreased remarkably”. Louis Kuijs of Oxford Economics, a research outfit, calculates that the “output gap”—between production and capacity—for Chinese industry as a whole was zero in 2007; by 2015, it was 13.1% for industry overall, and much higher for heavy industry.
1 European Union Chamber of Commerce in China 驻华欧盟商会 2 reveal 揭示;显示;透露 3 coastal [ˈkəʊstl] 沿海的4 utilisation 利用 (英)5 outfit 团队;小组;分队