Fortune International | GPE – July 16, 2017:
The current focus of China on infrastructure development was explained in a special report originally published online by Fortune International on May 23rd 2013 – excerpted below:
China is at a crossroads. Its leaders are committed to dramatically transforming the world’s second-largest economy. They want so-called knowledge businesses to supplement manufacturing. They want to increase domestic consumption to bolster growth. They want the world to covet Chinese brands.
Business and political leaders from around the world will discuss and debate this ambitious vision at Fortune’s upcoming Global Forum in the western city of Chengdu on June 6-8 (2013). But signs of a New China already are emerging, as you’ll discover by reading this special report.
Beijing-based Lenovo is producing innovative tech products. Wanda Group of Dalian is building domestic theme parks and resorts. And the Chinese government is investing heavily in roads and railways to help middle-class and affluent consumers get there. These massive infrastructure projects help keep citizens employed — and, more important, could help China reach its next destination.
The Race To Build Roads:
A $207 Billion Investment To Head Off Future Traffic Jams:
In the past decade alone, China has built 31,000 miles of expressways. That’s about two-thirds the length of the entire U.S. Interstate Highway System, constructed at great cost since it was founded some 60 years ago. Today China boasts 49,000 miles of expressways — and some 2.6 million miles of roads, more than double the amount in 2002.
And it’s still growing. Last year China invested $207 billion in road construction and upgrades, according to analysis by KPMG. The government’s current five-year plan in the country calls for at least 186,000 miles (and many billions of dollars) more by 2015, with plans to complete nine separate north-south lines and 18 expressways running east to west. Seven additional routes radiate from Beijing to China’s borders.
“Most of this infrastructure is catch-up,” says Sam Staley, a Florida State University professor who studies transportation in the country for the Reason Foundation. China is home to 20% of the world’s population but still has just 5.6% of its roads. In 2009, China surpassed the U.S. to become the world’s largest car market, with 19.3 million vehicles sold last year.
Highway construction has been an important part of China’s efforts to create jobs. Last year the country had 46 businesses in the industry, with 710,500 employees and a $12.3 billion payroll, according to research firm IBISWorld.
But leadership expects that the roadways will play a critical role in transporting suppliers and finished goods from factories to ports, and in helping make logistics more efficient. (Among the most watched endeavors are massive bridge projects. The most highly anticipated undertaking is a 50-kilometer six-lane bridge linking China’s southern Guangdong province with Hong Kong and Macau. It is slated for completion in 2016 and proponents claim it will reduce travel time from mainland China to Hong Kong from more than four hours to 40 minutes.)
Says Staley: “They’re not done by any stretch of the imagination.” Or any stretch of highway…
To read full report – please click here.
