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November 17, 2005
How much do we know about China?
BEIJING -- "Excuse me for my frankness," said Andy Wei, pouring another cup of tea in his top-level Beijing office, "but American media report little about China."
"Whenever someone comes to visit from the U.S. or Europe, they always see things that are different from what the media tells them, if they're told anything at all. People will ask me if Deng Xiaoping is president. They don't know Hu Jintao. They know about bird flu, SARS. They don't know China."
Andy Wei knows China. He heads the Beijing office of Goodrich, a supplier for Boeing and other companies that has something on nearly every airplane made today. Wei's been at Goodrich and predecessor, pre-merger companies since shortly after he left the Chinese Air Force for 18 years in 1991. He started in the Air Force as a translator, and he still translates -- China to his bosses in America, America to his employees in China.
...
Outsourcing is global reality everywhere, he said. "Singapore used to be strong in shipbuilding. Now that's shifted to South Korea and China. Singapore concentrates on IT and services. If they compete in shipbuilding, they fail. Americans and Europeans must also adapt to change."
But he said he wonders if they will -- if they're informed enough about economics to understand the basics of global development. And that brought him to his original point.
"I don't think Americans are informed about what's happening here, the good that's happening here. This country is underdeveloped, and it needs growth," he said. "This is fair competition, and you can't stop that."
Bjerga has been traveling China for the last month or so reporting on the aviation industry.
Posted by William Polley at November 17, 2005 3:59 PM
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Comments
I'm getting the story that in other economic sectors the Chinese are ready to move up the production chain to produce and export more complex machiery, etc. When will this happen in the aircraft area? Will we see it first in parts?
Posted by: spencer at November 17, 2005 4:40 PM
We already see it in parts. As part of their purchases they require a certain amount of locally purchased content. When you sell to the government, the government determines what is fair.
Posted by: Lord at November 19, 2005 11:33 AM
The myopia may not be confined to China. The press does us no favors when we are shocked by the riots in France for example, the continuing starvation in Africa, the impending post-earthqake disaster in Pakistan, the after math of the distruction from the tsunami in Indochina. We get lots of coverage on the cleanup in New Orleans.
China is "undoubtably underdeveloped and needing growth" as Wei says, and getting lots of FDI, no? Nothing like what it (and India) will need if Setser, among others, is right about the future investment flows that so far are busy financing US deficits.
Posted by: calmo at November 20, 2005 12:21 PM
Oil and natural gas--in short, energy--may be the fly in everyone's ointment. China may be a Johnny-Come-Lately to industrialization.
The next couple of years will tell the story. It may be gruesome.
Posted by: Stormy at November 20, 2005 12:22 PM