There are lots of mixed messages out there. The pain in the market may still be a long way from over. However, long term, China is still going to need a bucketful of resources. GBG is extremely well positioned for the future.
Posted on ABC online.
China's new reform: building bigger cities Posted Thu Dec 18, 2008 6:22pm AEDT Updated Thu Dec 18, 2008 6:23pm AEDT Analysts say the next generation of Chinese cities will have to focus on being environmentally friendly. (Reuters: Jason Lee) China's past 30 years of reforms have planted seeds that will in the coming decades produce future coastal megacities, an urban population of one billion and possibly the world's biggest economy. What the next 30 years of reforms have in store may be unclear but experts agree that with widespread pollution problems and a tidal wave of migration set to hit China's cities, urbanisation will be the nation's biggest challenge. "The next 30 years are going to be a critical timetable for addressing all the needs of a large population and how China manages cities," said James Canton, author of The Extreme Future. By 2025 China's urban population is expected to rise to 926 million from 572 million in 2005, an increase of more than the current United States population, according to management consultants McKinsey and Company. By 2030 that number will increase to one billion. Over the next two decades China will build 20,000 to 50,000 new skyscrapers - the equivalent of 10 New York cities, according to McKinsey. More than 170 cities will need mass transit systems by 2025, more than twice the number in all of Europe, in what McKinsey describes as the "greatest boom in mass-transit in history." Chinese cities will leverage their manufacturing strengths to become innovation centres for products such as nanotechnology, smart materials and state-of-the-art pharmaceuticals, Mr Canton predicted.
GBG Price at posting:
62.3¢ Sentiment: LT Buy Disclosure: Held
