China Development And Redevelopment

A legacy of grinding poverty left by centuries of stagnation, chaos and isolation is finally fading. An increasingly self-confident nation now seeks a place in the world worthy of a country that is home to more than one-fifth of humankind. "There lies a sleeping giant," Napoleon once said of this ancient land. "Let her sleep, for when she wakes she will shake the world." For better or worse, China is awakening.

A brochure touts the housing development as "Pure American." The interior of one model home looks like it was ripped from a Pottery Barn catalog. On the shelves are volumes of Encyclopaedia Britannica and novels by Tom Clancy, James Michener and Judy Blume. A framed photo shows a couple laughing on their wedding day. Another is of Andy Griffith with Opie by his side. In the recreation room, the board game Sorry lies open on a table. Welcome to Orange County. No, not that Orange County.

Guangdong Sets Sights High: Guangdong, China's fastest growing province, plans to expand at nearly 13% a year for the next 20 years in its drive to catch up with Asia's other high-growth economies, Gov. Zhu Senlin said. Earlier this year, Deng Xiaoping, China's 87-year-old leader, encouraged provincial authorities to strive for the level of development of Asia's four "dragons"--Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore. Soon after, officials began to redraw their development plans.

I. M. Pei never lived there. But relatives of the renowned architect are clinging to the hope that his fame will help them save the old house that stands as the last reminder of the family's heyday in turn-of-the-century Shanghai. To make way for a giant greenbelt, the city is planning to flatten the mansion that Pei's great-uncle bought in 1911.

Leticia Shahani, Philippine senator and sister of President Fidel Ramos "Of course I am surprised at the very rapid economic growth (in China). Already we in the Philippines are beginning to feel its strength in terms of the handicraft industry, baskets, furniture and so forth. . . . China is now a serious competitor. On the other hand, I think relations have improved since China has opened up. . . . Our cultural links are quite strong in terms of food, inter-marriage, people-to-people contacts.

Premier Li Peng, making his first public statement in the debate over economic policy, said in a speech published Tuesday that China should pursue a policy of slow but steady growth. "You can ask the ordinary folk, do they feel their living standard has fallen? Most think things aren't going too bad, prices are stable and goods in the markets are abundant," Li said, defending a two-year-old austerity policy that critics say has slowed the economy too sharply.

A group of Chinese experts has approved a plan to build a giant dam on the Yangtze River that would involve resettling more than a million people. The 500-member panel approved the Three Gorges Dam proposal after a 32-month study. There is strong opposition to the proposed dam development, and the plan has gone to China's top leadership for study. Building the huge dam would take about 18 years and cost an estimated $9.8 billion.

One of China's so-called "Special Economic Zones"--Shenzhen, located next to the Hong Kong border--will hold a three day, 10th anniversary celebration starting next Monday. The commemoration is expected to highlight the zone's rapid growth and to promote its image for potential investors.

To look around Shanghai, you wouldn't think that China is struggling to stave off an economic crisis. Cranes hover over sites for new skyscrapers and apartment blocks, though hundreds recently built are half-empty. Bulldozers sweep away old houses and even new buildings to make way for elevated highways. Steamrollers will soon press runways for the city's second international airport. The city is building with a fervor that implies boundless wealth. Thanks to a $1.

To begin to grasp the full import and direction of the changes occurring in China today, visit the Beijing Yanhua Petrochemical Co. at a sprawling complex about an hour's drive from China's capital city. Yanhua, a subsidiary of a government-owned chemical enterprise, was created last year to expand output of ethylene, a basic material for plastics, and of butadiene styrene rubber, a material for tires.

China's booming economy faces a $34.5-billion bill in the coming years to clean up an environmental mess caused by lax enforcement of pollution laws, outdated technology and massive under-funding, a new report said. The report, "The China Environmental Market: A Technology Transfer Approach," said China's rapid economic growth had brought with it serious and costly pollution problems.

Long Beach-based mall developer Harry Newman believes that the future growth of retailing in China will mirror the kind of development that happened in Orange County in decades past. Newman, who owns Mall of Orange and has been building shopping centers in Southern California for three decades, believes that the American concept of big, regional centers will catch on in China. China is inviting developers from the U.S.

In times past, Asian business people could judge the outlook for their own companies by watching the economy of the United States, their biggest export market. More recently, they watched Japan. Now, a third locomotive of growth has burst forth on the Asian scene. "China has become an engine, and the principal one for the Pacific region," Lawrence Krause, a professor at the University of California, San Diego, wrote in the annual prospectus of the Pacific Economic Cooperation Council.

Bechtel Inc., Chinese Firm in Joint Venture: The San Francisco-based construction and engineering group has set up a joint venture with China International Trust & Investment Corp. to manage construction of a $3- to $6-billion port planned for eastern China. The equally owned venture, Xinde Joint Development Co., will serve as a marketing and operations organization for development of Daxie Island, south of Shanghai, the companies said in a statement.

Plan Unveiled for Port Project: One of Beijing's biggest conglomerates announced details of a plan to build China's deepest port, which would require billions of dollars in foreign investment. Officials of China International Trust & Investment Corp. presented a 15-year schedule for development of Daxie Island, an area of 12 square miles off Ningbo in the east coast province of Zhejiang.

When Kentucky Fried Chicken's Col. Sanders faces off against Glorious China Chicken at a crowded Beijing crossroads, you know you are on the front line of China's fast-food wars. Foreign and local firms are fighting hard for shares in a nationwide market worth $3.5 billion last year and expected to grow at 20% annually. On one corner of the intersection is Kentucky Fried Chicken, which opened in 1988 and now serves 3,000 customers a day, pulling in about $175,000 a month.