China wants to build infastructure in the US

[Zor]

Linkage

China wants to convert some of its mountain of U.S. government debt into investment in renovating American roads and subways, the commerce minister said Friday.

Speaking to a business group, Chen Deming said China wants closer co-operation with the United States in infrastructure, clean energy and technology.

Such investments would tie China more closely to Western economies and might help defuse fears Beijing will use its $3.2-trillion in foreign reserves -- some $1.15-trillion of that in Treasury and other U.S. government debt -- as a political weapon.

“We hope to achieve cooperation in the area of infrastructure,” Chen told members of the American Chamber of Commerce in China.

Chen said he was amazed at the high quality of American subways and other infrastructure when he visited 20 years ago but many roads, railways and ports today need renovation.

“China is willing to turn some of our holdings of your debt into investment in the United States, hoping to create jobs for the United States,” he said.

Also this week, the chairman of China's sovereign wealth fund said it wants to invest in projects to improve British roads and infrastructure. He said that would help to boost feeble global economic growth.

Beijing is encouraging Chinese companies to investment more abroad to reduce the country's reliance on exports and investment. It has sent trade and investment delegations to the United States, Europe and elsewhere to look for opportunities.

Mr. Chen said Beijing wants to see Chinese and U.S. companies cooperate more closely on clean energy, environmental and energy-saving technology, information technology biotechnology, pharmaceuticals and medical devices.

The minister acknowledged disagreements between Beijing and Washington over global trade talks, trade in environmental technology and other areas but said the two governments had more areas of common interest.

Mr. Chen repeated Beijing's longstanding appeal to Washington to relax restrictions on exports of “dual use” technologies with possible weapons applications.

“We hope Chinese-U.S. trade will continue to grow and the imbalance will shrink. But that takes both of us to achieve,” he said.

China's economic growth should be above 9 per cent next year despite “difficulties and obstacles” in the global economy that are battering consumer demand, Mr. Chen said. He noted that China also faces domestic problems including inflation.

Beijing eased lending curbs this week in an effort to spur business growth, reversing course after spending the past two years trying to cool an overheated economy with interest rate hikes and investment controls.

“I can assure you the Chinese economy will have a slight slowdown but nonetheless it will enjoy stable and sound development,” Mr. Chen said.

A rather interesting turn of events.

Zor

[Broomstick]

My first thought was - what sort of quality control do these projects have? Because while the Chinese can certainly do some impressive things, their quality control, from what I've seen, isn't always up to western standards.

[Esquire]

Presumably a project taking place in the US and under US oversight would be conducted according to US quality standards - as I understand it, the Chinese government would just be providing funds, and therefore jobs.

On a related note, does anybody else find this extremely ironic?

[bobalot]

My first thought was - what sort of quality control do these projects have? Because while the Chinese can certainly do some impressive things, their quality control, from what I've seen, isn't always up to western standards.

I don't think that will be a problem. It is probable that most construction will be done using local labour and companies. Any work would have to comply with local regulations.

EDIT: Esquire beat me to it.

[Soontir C'boath]

They may still get a Chinese firm/s to do the construction. They've been doing these kind of things around the world for awhile.

Here's Why China Gave Costa Rica A $105 Million Stadium And Flooded Its Soccer Federation With Cash

Costa Rica's brand new, $105 million Estadio Nacional was built entirely by the Chinese.

It was paid for by a Chinese company, built by Chinese workers, and made with Chinese materials as part of a 2007 agreement.

The stadium — officially a gift from China to the people of Costa Rica — has already hosted exhibitions against soccer giants Argentina, Brazil, and Spain since it opened in March.

And China provided the cash to bring those teams to the tiny Central American nation as well.

So what did they get in return?

The Football Ramble has the details in a story today:

Costa Rica severed its longstanding economic ties with Taiwan.
Costa Rica made China its second-biggest trading partner by signing a free trade agreement just two weeks after the stadium opened.

Not everyone is pleased with new-found relationship between the two countries.

Costa Rica didn't apply its tough labor laws to the Chinese company that built the stadium — so workers worked long hours and one even died in an on-site accident.

But Costa Rica's soccer team will surely benefit from the world-class stadium and the infusion of cash.

In fact, they're looking better already — Costa Rica earned a 2-2 draw with mighty Spain at the China-built stadium last night.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

The Chinese government generally favours Chinese contractors, and Chinese companies have generally favoured their own brethren. When they set up shop in Africa, they brought in lots of their own people.

[Serafina]

Something like this has already been attempted several times in Europe, and failed quite often due to failure to comply with safety regulations.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Something like this has already been attempted several times in Europe, and failed quite often due to failure to comply with safety regulations.

The concept of complying with anything is rather alien in China.

[Pelranius]

The Chinese government generally favours Chinese contractors, and Chinese companies have generally favoured their own brethren. When they set up shop in Africa, they brought in lots of their own people.

Part of that had to do with a lack of suitable labor in Africa. The qualified workers were often already spoken for, as I understand it.

[aerius]

Something like this has already been attempted several times in Europe, and failed quite often due to failure to comply with safety regulations.

Hello styrofoam bridges! Boy do I feel safe now!

[Stark]

My first thought was - what sort of quality control do these projects have? Because while the Chinese can certainly do some impressive things, their quality control, from what I've seen, isn't always up to western standards.

I remember that thread. What a lol.

As any not prejudiced person knows, it's less about the country you deal with and more about the individual companies and their priorities. As any not-retarded person knows, Chinese companies can sure build roads just as well as an American work crew, but they sure have some hells dodgey organisations (especially those linked to the government or 'new capitalists') who will probably have absolutely no regard for local industrial law. This might not be a big deal in America, where it's second-world IR stuff, but I've dealt with the challenges of integrating some reasonably dodgey fly-by-night mining orgs from China into Australia, and the ingrained culture of graft and disregard for standards or employees can be quite high. It'd be interesting to see if they'd tout out their respectable orgs or the more profit-and-bribes driven ones.

Amusingly, the second is far more American.

[mr friendly guy]

China is already building American infrastructure, or at least parts of it, with local assembly done by American workers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/busin ... wanted=all

Published: June 25, 2011

The assembly work in California, and the pouring of the concrete road surface, will be done by Americans. But construction of the bridge decks and the materials that went into them are a Made in China affair. California officials say the state saved hundreds of millions of dollars by turning to China.

In New York City alone, Chinese companies have won contracts to help renovate the subway system, refurbish the Alexander Hamilton Bridge over the Harlem River and build a new Metro-North train platform near Yankee Stadium. As with the Bay Bridge, American union labor would carry out most of the work done on United States soil.

To ensure the bridge meets safety standards, 250 employees and consultants working for the state of California and American Bridge/Fluor also took up residence in Shanghai.

China already builds gigantic infrastructure such as really long bridges, including in typhoon prone areas, eg Hangzhou Bay bridge. The Dong Hai bridge withstood what typhoon Chanchu could throw at it in 2006, although it had to decrease the speed limits of vehicles for safety reasons.

Its amazing that some people are only just figuring out that China builds infrastructure for the US and they have been building giant projects domestically for a while now. Remember, if one part of climate change science is wrong some Chinese companies are dodgy all of climate change science is wrong Chinese companies are. Hey, where have I seen that type of reasoning before.

[Broomstick]

My first thought was - what sort of quality control do these projects have? Because while the Chinese can certainly do some impressive things, their quality control, from what I've seen, isn't always up to western standards.

I remember that thread. What a lol.

As any not prejudiced person knows, it's less about the country you deal with and more about the individual companies and their priorities. As any not-retarded person knows, Chinese companies can sure build roads just as well as an American work crew, but they sure have some hells dodgey organisations (especially those linked to the government or 'new capitalists') who will probably have absolutely no regard for local industrial law.

Yes, that's more or less what I said, but without using the "p" word. You see, we have companies in my area that are based in Japan, Germany, and other countries and as a general rule you can expect them to comply with local laws because of something called "reputation". We all know there are bad boys in Japan, Germany, etc. but they tend to be very much a minority.

Then we have China, with the poisoned toothpaste, the poisoned pet food, the poisoned baby formula... major, major scandals that have hurt and killed people both within China and various other locations around the world. Not to mention the "trash bridge" linked to by Aerius. This also creates that mysterious thing called "reputation", but of a more negative sort.

So, it's not prejudice in the sense of irrational belief, but rather looking at the evidence that China had shoddy controls, protections that are either non-existent or poorly enforced. Not to mention their environmental pollution problems. And yet you accuse me of prejudice for not wanting poisoned food, water or air, or collapsing infrastructure where I live?

It'd be interesting to see if they'd tout out their respectable orgs or the more profit-and-bribes driven ones.

Amusingly, the second is far more American.

You have a peculiarly twisted view of the US. Although that's not news.

The thing is, the Chinese can and do build very lasting and high quality infrastructure, and have for a long, long time. They just don't do it consistently right now. It's like stuff manufactured in China. Some of it is quite good. Some of it is shit. Oddly enough, you can get both from the same source. WTF? Haven't they heard of quality control over there?

[Duckie]

Are you seriously stating it's incomprehensible that a nation three times larger than your own massive one could have internal variations in product quality, and that it reflects poorly on an entire race of human being and nation?

Isn't that like expressing disbelief in America there could be gourmet restaurants in the same nation as burger dives, and further distrusting American food because there's a random chance it could all be McDonalds?

[Shroom Man 777]

To be fair as China is more recently industrialized than Japan or Thanasia Germany, it stands to reason that a lot of their products are still catching up, not only because of shitty regulations, but because they're still working out their techniques and metallurgies and material sciences and shit and have not yet had the decades of fucking around folks like the Japanese and Thanasians Germans have had.

Them all going capitalistic and exploding and manufacturing everything for everyone everywhere certainly won't help things.

On the more smarmy note, god is it ironic that these children of Mao in the fucking People's Republic of China have had, through supercapitalism and outsourcing and free trade shits and corporate greed, ended up inducing unemployment in Western nations like the US and UK cause now everything is being manufactured in China (and double ironies for working conditions in places in communoid China like Foxconn resembling the age of the robber baron). And now they're offering to build infrastructure. We are living in magnificent times.

[Broomstick]

Are you seriously stating it's incomprehensible that a nation three times larger than your own massive one could have internal variations in product quality, and that it reflects poorly on an entire race of human being and nation?

It's incomprehensible to me that the Chinese tolerate shitting in their own air and drinking water to the extent that they do - the US woke up to a problem in the 1960's and started cleaning up our act, why can't they? It's incomprehensible to me that a largely authoritarian regime can't get a better grip on the problem of contamination of their own food supply. The depth of product adulteration is, at times, breath-taking.

As I have repeatedly said - the Chinese can and do produce some good stuff. They also produce some incredibly bad shit and hazardous conditions. What assurances do I have that the company moving into my neighborhood is one of the good ones?

Isn't that like expressing disbelief in America there could be gourmet restaurants in the same nation as burger dives, and further distrusting American food because there's a random chance it could all be McDonalds?

Nope, I'm not talking about low-end and high-end products. Some stuff is intended to be inexpensive, disposable, and non-durable (think disposable silverware and toilet paper). I'm talking about hazardous products. It would as if one couldn't go to an American restaurant, whether fast-food or gourmet, without a serious risk of food-borne illness. While we do have occasional outbreaks, as any nation does, when we have a product contamination we don't try to sweep it under the rug, if anything, we err on the side of caution. That's why we tend to have a death toll of under 20 when it happens, and not a few hundred as in China.

If Chinese companies come here and build stuff that meets our standards that's fine. I mean, I fully support the Chinese student pilots that are keeping my local airport afloat because, even if they directly employ only a few flight instructors, their presence here as consumers helps our local economy because they rent accommodations and purchases food and goods. I purchase Chinese goods on a regular basis. But it's hardly unreasonable for me to expect that I get what I pay for and that whatever it is, is not misrepresented.

If they Chinese did move into my neighborhood to build roads and bridges what assurances would i have that they would meet at least US standards of construction, as opposed to using trash bags in place of reinforced concrete? Will they submit to the same inspections as local contractors (which is already minimal in my opinion) or will it be a sweetheart deal lining the pockets of a select few and the locals forbidden to "interfere" in the sense of regulatory agencies overseeing the work and that it is done properly? As has been pointed out, China's track record is inconsistent on building things. They really do need to improve their reputation and the only way to do that is by consistent good work.

[Duckie]

But yet even after that disease outbreak from Europe (in a nation far, far smaller than China with far less agricultural surplus, so outbreaks should happen proportionally less as there is less food being produced), Organic German food is not considered suspect. Why does China have all of its failures remembered but nobody once worries when eating a brussel sprout from some farm in Germany?

Basically what you are saying is "Chinese people (not certain companies, but all people with that skin colour!) have made bad products before, so the entire nation is suspect", yet this doesn't seem to apply this to any other countries who have had tainted food problems or corrupt building codes.

[Shroom Man 777]

How many disease outbreaks do European foods have? It also depends on how many times these things happen and also very importantly how they're reported in the media and suchs.

Is it a case of bias? Japanese are also foreigners, and their products also threatened locally made ones, yet nowadays a whole lot of people prefer their stuff because their stuff is damn good.

[Duckie]

The reputation of Japanese products as some kind of technological marvel of having amazing quality control or whatnot compared to any other first world nation is mostly illusions and marketing, but sure. I'm not claiming that every Chinese company produces Porsche-tolerance parts or that the milk scandal never happened (although I will note that most Chinese eat Chinese made food and drive on Chinese made roads and whatnot and generally aren't dead yet). But one shouldn't suspect the products solely because of the racial origin of the company. It just doesn't seem appropriate.

[Shroom Man 777]

I suspect it's not racial whatevers but mostly basic fundamental human lapses in generalizing or stereotyping or labeling things by groups.

If a lot of unrelated Spanish stuff also got tainted over a period of time, people would undoubtedly say that they'd be leery of Spanish stuff that might be poisonous.

It's the same but more positive thought process that leads people to go on how a lot of Japanese products are generally of good quality, and this leads to Japan = awsum productos.

Media and shit also plays into it.

What if I said that I'd be leery of a lot of Mainland Chinese products, thus generalizing or stereotyping negatively, but then I'd also say that I think foods from Macao like egg tarts, or clothes from Hong Kong, or tech products from Taiwan or whatever from Singapore, are fuck awesome and non-lousy/poisonous, and thus also generalizing or stereotyping but positively (by ignoring individual variations of foods/shits from individual companies in Macao/HK/Taiwan/Singa)? I'd still be a stereotypical generalizing generalissimo, yet would it be racism, since all of these guys are (mostly) Chinese yet of different labels? One can stereotype and generalize things by groups without it being driven solely by race, but due to marketing/media/reputation stuffs.

[Broomstick]

But yet even after that disease outbreak from Europe (in a nation far, far smaller than China with far less agricultural surplus, so outbreaks should happen proportionally less as there is less food being produced), Organic German food is not considered suspect. Why does China have all of its failures remembered but nobody once worries when eating a brussel sprout from some farm in Germany?

You're talking to someone who hasn't brought fresh spinach in the US for a number years since that E. coli outbreak we had. I actually do hold certain US agricultural products suspect. That's why I grow my own leafy greens rather than buy them. It happens just too damn often here for me to be comfortable. Since I spent a week in the hospital in 2005 with norovirus I've got a lot more suspicious of food.

With China, it's not ONE outbreak, or even a few. There was the pet food melamine contamination of 2007 which was global, not localized to China, and the Chinese first response wasn't "we'll have to look into this and see what's causing it" but complete denial the protein was export from China at all. By May of that year there was evidence that animal feed for animals intended for human consumption exported to North America had been contaminated (so far as I know, no human illness arose from it). The contaminated toothpaste in 2007 from China went global, and quite a bit of it was "counterfeit", having brand name labeling and packaging though not manufactured by those companies. Then there was the Sanlu milk contamination of 2008, which resulted in over 240,000 ill babies in China, and there were still occasional contaminated products showing up in 2010 in the provinces. 240,000 sick infants - way to go. When was the last time North America or Europe had 80,000 ill from contaminated food (divided by 3 under the notion that both N. America and Europe have roughly 1/3 of China's population)

A few others were White Rabbit Creamy Candy (formaldehyde in 2007, melamine in 2008); the contaminated heparin of Baxter, Corp in 2008 (19 deaths in the US alone); the 2007 Mattel toy recall because some of the paint used on the toys was up to 11% lead, FAR exceeding permitted levels, and surprise! it all came from Chinese factories; in 2005 excessive levels of lead were found in artificial Christmas tress manufactured in China - this is all just in the past few years. And this is aside from concerns like tilapia filets from China that are products of Chinese fish farms and possible heavy metal contamination in them, and the "pine mouth" issues with China exporting pine nuts from species that are unsuitable for human consumption - granted the latter is more an annoyance than serious health problem, but really, it's just one more aggravation on top of it.

Basically what you are saying is "Chinese people (not certain companies, but all people with that skin colour!) have made bad products before, so the entire nation is suspect", yet this doesn't seem to apply this to any other countries who have had tainted food problems or corrupt building codes.

We're discussing China here, not other countries, but it's not like I haven't spoken out about corruption and problems elsewhere in other threads. I don't really understand this leap to "Broomstick hates yellow people" or whatever, when there are actual problems that have resulted in actual illness and death to people. If I said I went through a period where I refused to eat any meat product from Britain due to mad cow concerns would you have leapt immediately to "Rar! Broomstick hates white people!"? Or is this a kneejerk assumption that white people are someone more prone to bigotry than those of other skin colors?

When my spouse and I recently started a small business and found we would have to go to China for certain supplies we didn't give up on the whole matter, we looked at likely candidates and spent a few weeks researching them to determine if they were trustworthy or not. As it happens, we've been very happy with what they've sent us. Likewise, in my current paying job we see a LOT of shoes made in China. Some manufacturers are clearly getting a quality product that's well made. Some others are getting utter shit, seriously, drunk monkeys could do better work. I had to re-attach 6 shoe soles yesterday that were falling apart because of grossly insufficient levels of cement used in the original manufacture. New shoes, falling apart, because someone was too fucking cheap to use enough glue. Let be a little more clear - when soles are glued to a shoe you're supposed to coat the entire surface of the sole where it contacts the shoe in cement. I'm seeing shoes where all the glue used is the equivalent of a pencil line squiggled down the center of the sole. It's gross incompetence and the only rationale I can think of is "save money on glue". Funny, though - certain brands you can trust to be made correctly and wear well, clearly marked "made in China", and others it's a crapshoot if the shoe or boots will last a week - also "made in China". I suspect that in the former cases the companies ordering the product are keeping an eye on things, whereas in the latter they either using the most utter shit companies, or they don't give a shit. And that's what I mean by they aren't consistent. Which all of you conveniently seem to ignore. It's not that I categorically reject Chinese made products, it's just that I feel I have to fucking research every goddamned little piece, whereas I can rely on, say, a Toyota product to be quality until proven otherwise.

And while you're going on and on about Japanese being equated to quality these days I remember when it wasn't so - back in the 1960's "Japanese made" was a synonym for "cheap ass junk". The Japanese turned that around. How? Hard work and quality control. They fixed their problems. I sincerely hope the Chinese do likewise, but the facts remain they do have problems with material substitutions, product adulterations, and contamination right now. This isn't something I've pulled out of my ass, it's been in headlines around the world for a number of years. 2007 in particular seemed to be a bad year for Chinese products.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

The reputation of Japanese products as some kind of technological marvel of having amazing quality control or whatnot compared to any other first world nation is mostly illusions and marketing, but sure. I'm not claiming that every Chinese company produces Porsche-tolerance parts or that the milk scandal never happened (although I will note that most Chinese eat Chinese made food and drive on Chinese made roads and whatnot and generally aren't dead yet). But one shouldn't suspect the products solely because of the racial origin of the company. It just doesn't seem appropriate.

I dunno about you, but speaking as a Singaporean Chinese, I have come to learn that the Chinese aren't known for scruples.

Part of that had to do with a lack of suitable labor in Africa. The qualified workers were often already spoken for, as I understand it.

I highly doubt construction workers from China are any better than those in Africa. Even in Singapore, this notorious habit surfaces among the Indians and Chinese.

[aerius]

To ensure the bridge meets safety standards, 250 employees and consultants working for the state of California and American Bridge/Fluor also took up residence in Shanghai.

The problem is this is what must be done to make sure the quality is acceptable, and even then it might not be enough. Back when I worked in the electronics industry, one of the companies I worked for stopped using Chinese made parts because the cost of doing QC on them got completely out of hand. It turns out our supplier was changing its subcontractors & parts sourcing all the time to save costs, it just became impossible to QC all the parts to make sure they met specs. Normally you'd pull a few samples from each production batch for QC, but we were having to QC every single part.

Also relating to the electronics industry, we have the infamous capacitor failure plague, which started in China, spread to Taiwan, got fixed in Taiwan after a few years, but is still ongoing in China. It started 10 years ago and they're still doing it. I've had a computer PSU and LCD monitor die on me in the past year or so thanks to these shoddy caps. This was also a massive pain in the ass for the electronics industry, not for the company I was working for at the time since we sourced all our capacitors from the US, but anyone sourcing them from China or Taiwan was screwed unless they were making disposable consumer goods, in which case they didn't care since the customer will buy the crap anyway. They're still making these defective caps in China and they're still going into all sorts of consumer electronics.

[aieeegrunt]

To ensure the bridge meets safety standards, 250 employees and consultants working for the state of California and American Bridge/Fluor also took up residence in Shanghai.

The problem is this is what must be done to make sure the quality is acceptable, and even then it might not be enough. Back when I worked in the electronics industry, one of the companies I worked for stopped using Chinese made parts because the cost of doing QC on them got completely out of hand. It turns out our supplier was changing its subcontractors & parts sourcing all the time to save costs, it just became impossible to QC all the parts to make sure they met specs. Normally you'd pull a few samples from each production batch for QC, but we were having to QC every single part.

.

Factory I work in this was our exact experience as well. Anything sourced from China was useless junk; any marginal savings by their stuff being cheaper was more than outweighed by the fact that you have to either 100% sort it, or your going to be reworking like 50% of it. They can't even give you a box of rubber bushings that has the same consistency of rubber in it; some of them will be rocks, some of them will be marshmallows. Good luck running a press with that without having to knock half of them out each time. The Americans in some ways are almost worse; we recently tried to outsource our steel tube production to some minimum wage operation in the USA and predictably they can neither make steel properly nor cut a tube to a consistent length properly nor weld a cap to one end properly.

I wouldn't trust bargain labour make me a sandwich, much less a bridge. Bottom line is that you get what you pay for; you pay 10 cents an hour to some starving peasant he's not exactly going to make a world class product. Hilariously the most profitable factory in our corporate cluster is also the one with the highest labour cost because it makes the least scrap and has virtually no QA problems. The evil socialist full benefit 20 dollar an hour Canadians are always in the lead, followed by the don't know how to convert this Mexicans, and the 8 dollar an hour Murrican slave labour southerners are dead last every time. Corporate got so fed up they actually sent most of our managers to Georgia for three months to try and sort out that mess. Every time I see the USA take another step closer to Randian Dystopia in a way it makes my job more secure. Keep telling yourselves that being 100% service based will solve all your problems, or that blue collar work can be done on the cheap.

[Shroom Man 777]

You have a peculiarly twisted view of the US. Although that's not news.

A generator we bought from China also had shit rubber tubing. It melted, because diesel passed through it, and it was like the hose for the fuel tank or some shit. So, we had to get another tube/hose/whatever, because apparently the Chinese generator's fuel hose melted when exposed to... fuel.