Island Life by David Slack

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Island Life: We are all Chinese now

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  • Seamus Harris,

    Indeed, it would be an awful lot of work to try identifying all parts of the electorate who have inexplicable personal biases.

    That said, we are not talking about some nebulous fringe element here. We are talking about the majority of PRC-born New Zealanders. Moreover, the inexplicable personal bias in question is completely external to New Zealand.

    Seems remarkable enough to be worth commenting on.

    Alas I'm in no position to organize a flying squad. Even if I was I'd clean up some other problems before this one. Distasteful as it is, I don't find it nearly so bad as, for example, pay-to-work immigration scams, paying restaurant staff well below minimum wage, and so on.

    Auckland • Since May 2008 • 49 posts Report Reply

  • Jamil Anderlini,

    Hi David,
    Sorry for the delay in replying, I've been busy with the global financial meltdown.

    Here are some answers to your questions:


    Can I ask a few questions?

    given the damage that has been done to brand NZ by Fonterra's ill-advised involvement in the poisonous Chinese dairy industry.

    How substantial do you gauge the damage to be?


    I think the damage is significant. The Communist Party built up an enormous amount of goodwill among its citizens in the aftermath of the earthquake and with its largely successful staging of the Olympics but most people I talk to here say that has all been wiped out by the poisoned milk scandal. Fonterra and New Zealand have been tied to the scandal from the beginning by state media and did not have such a large reserve of goodwill to fall back on.



    The financial regulators here have been very conservative about allowing Chinese institutions to invest abroad

    Are they in a position to do so now? Could they become significant firesale investors if the world economy really tanks?


    Chinese institutions are cash-rich and eager to expand abroad but, following a series of disastrous offshore investments by China’s sovereign wealth fund, banks and an insurer last year (in Blackstone, Morgan Stanley, Fortis, Barclays etc), the government has basically stopped all offshore financial investments this year. The fear of being the “dumb money” that bails out Wall Street banks has stopped China taking advantage of firesale prices but they would have faced political resistance in the US and Europe anyway. Governments in those places would much rather nationalize large swathes of their financial systems (as they’re doing now) than let them fall into the hands of the Chinese Communist Party, which still owns the vast majority of the Chinese financial system. That said, China has over US$2trillion in foreign exchange reserves and the secretive entity that manages those reserves has been quietly taking small equity stakes in public markets all over the world, as well as making investments for purely political reasons – see this story for details: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/beaf16ae-8063-11dd-99a9-000077b07658.html


    I do agree that NZ should be looking more to this part of the world in all sorts of fields.

    Taking the view that China is not immune or decoupled, what export growth possibilities for NZ might we nevertheless contemplate in the next few years?


    The people who should be looking to China are those working in the creative and innovative industries, where China is weakest. Architects, designers, artists, inventors etc, environmental innovators.
    As far as physical exports are concerned, New Zealand should be leveraging its clean, green image. As China becomes even more polluted and food scares continue to occur, NZ should be promoting clean, organic produce and high quality products made from natural ingredients. I know there is nothing new in this but it is important not to forget your strengths and I think NZ has missed huge opportunities by not becoming much more of a leader on environmental issues at a much earlier stage.
    China is the most polluted place on the planet and will undoubtedly be the biggest market for clean energy and environmental cleanup technology for the foreseeable future.

    Beijing • Since May 2008 • 5 posts Report Reply

  • stephen walker,

    Thanks for your perspective, Jamil.

    NZ should be promoting clean, organic produce and high quality products made from natural ingredients....NZ has missed huge opportunities by not becoming much more of a leader on environmental issues at a much earlier stage.

    Except organisations such as Fonterra are not even vaguely onto it when it comes to formulating truly long-term sustainable strategies.

    Instead of trying to produce higher quality products using the same or fewer resources, they go hammer and tongs destroying NZ's environment on a scale unseen since the native forests were cleared. Mass pollution and degradation of NZ's fresh waterways and lakes, unprecedented aquifer depletion in the Canterbury Plains, huge levels of synthetic fertilizers wreaking havoc on the soil. It may be a good get rich quick scheme for the dairy farmers but it surely isn't a long-term strategy for enhancing NZ's "clean green" image overseas.

    The mentality in the NZ dairy secor appears the same as Wall St. or the City. Fast profits and bugger everyone else when it all (inevitably) collapses. They could have chosen to go down the low-input, organic path, but they chose not to because it would have meant less money in the short term. My rather Freudian explanation for Fonterra's wreckless behaviour is that I believe they think size is the most important thing. I mean, how could they have been so naive in taking such a large stake in San Lu with people on the board, without having a hands-on technical presence to ensure quality and safety were being maintained? China has been having major food contamiunation scares for years! Their credibility is in tatters. There would have to be a complete change in mindset at Fonterra to turn things around in China, IMO.

    nagano • Since Nov 2006 • 646 posts Report Reply

  • Chris Waugh,

    Seamus Harris: Taking the discussion over to your blog.

    Sam F: You're right, but swapping 归 for 龟 turns things pun-wards in my book. Visual representations, be the words or pictures, that I've seen suggest that Chinese people hear the pun, and not just the abbreviation.

    Main laptop is in the shop being (hopefully) fixed. Broke out the backup laptop, the old one we passed down to my brother in law and then reclaimed when our new one started playing up. This one is a little small and old, but it works properly.

    Jamil Anderlini and stephen walker: I hate to say it, but from where I sit in southern Chaoyang District, Beijing, I can only see three Kiwis playing to their strengths: Myself and my two Kiwi colleagues. I don't see any Kiwi companies, let alone industries playing up to what NZ does best. This frustrates me. Just as one example, China's wine industry is growing rapidly and Chinese vineyards, or at least vineyards in China, are even starting to produce pretty decent brews. And there's plenty of land in north China just crying out for decent viticulturalists. So why are NZ's excellent winemakers so hard to find here? And wine is certainly not the only area Kiwis excel in. To put it in more positive terms: NZ could be and should be doing much better in China.

    Wellington • Since Jan 2007 • 2401 posts Report Reply

  • JohnAmiria,

    The mentality in the NZ dairy sector appears the same as Wall St. or the City. Fast profits and bugger everyone else when it all (inevitably) collapses. They could have chosen to go down the low-input, organic path, but they chose not to because it would have meant less money in the short term.

    That is Capitalism, in a nutshell. Make money today, because who knows what will happen tomorrow? And by Jove, The Market has just proved them right again...

    (Not that I agree. I believe in Govt regulation)
    (with the exception of Showerheads)

    hither and yon • Since Aug 2008 • 215 posts Report Reply

  • mark taslov,

    Your reference to National is silly. I doubt many National voters are motivated primarily by the fact that National leans closer to the USA than Labor does. Loyalty to the USA is just one among numerous features of National Party policy. In any case, Labor is not exactly an enemy of the USA.

    seamus, excuse me here if i'm dwelling on this, your answer here seems typically illustrative of the binary perception people are bought into in the modern two party (progressive) democracy. It's not just labour and nat out there, and i agree that labour aren't particularly hardline about distancing themselves from the war machine that brought terrorism to its doorstep. but the recent quips over the iraq war, do highlight the distinction.

    the fact is that both of them still do lean close to the states or previously mother england
    and those places are the ones starting wars (in recent history).
    which evidently incites terrorism on the homefront
    so i fail to see how favoring parties that support that kind of trashy foreign policy is any worse than supporting candidates who support china with it's far more passive foreign policy. and dare i say it, not invading countries is just one among numerous features of CCP policy.

    for my own 19 cents and despite Winston, i don't think the Chinese new zealanders are gonna take over new zealand. having a member who is dedicated to developing relations/trade with china seems potentially more lucrative than a minister of the arts(not dissing the arts minister, just looking at what is gonna bring real money and opportunity into the country) so despite your misgivings seamus, the minister of china whether formally acknowledged or not could be one of the greatest political advancements in NZ political history.
    and streuth dude, it's not like they're aussies
    this MP could be a huge asset in developing relations between our two nations, and it's not like keeping prisoners jailed longer or providing tax cuts is going to bring any fresh cash into the homestead.

    i agree with what jamil and chris say regarding exploring the avenues. Jamil mentions the arts; there's an Australia and New Zealand shop in Jian wai Soho, where NZ products are relatively poorly represented, apart from a bit of wine and honey. on the top floor they're selling aboriginal paintings for 100,000rmb a pop. no NZ art there. That's a lot of money for relatively unknown names.

    another potential avenue is education, which the chinese are totally balls at, hence the huge number of overseas students, with international schools cleaning up, thinking Massey and other multibranch institutions or private schools with the capital.

    Mainly it is kind of rubbish when the thing your country is most famous for is the beautiful scenery on pirated DVDs.

    but, met some boys from Otara last year over here performing Maori dance, not sure how much they were making, but someone was obviously doing ok out of it.

    that cream has got to make it back home.
    or the inroads are fruitless*
    *see fonterra or what happened to steinlager here.

    Te Ika-a-Māui • Since Mar 2008 • 2281 posts Report Reply

  • Seamus Harris,

    Mark,

    I mentioned Labor because it is the only other large party in New Zealand. Personally I see voting Green as the most useful thing I can do with my vote. They annoy me with some of their policies, but at least they have a fresh take on things and realize that in the big picture the environmental challenges are the largest ones we face.

    I would not characterize China as having a passive foreign policy. It certainly doesn't feel that way if you are Taiwanese. The Vietnamese, and others, might also be scratching their heads. Not invading countries is simply NOT a feature of CCP policy. The oft repeated idea that China has a history of pacifism is laughable. Chinese empires were. . . surprise surprise. . . imperialistic and expansionist. Its hard for most people to get their head around (after all they were not white and didn't wear pith helmets) but in many cases they were colonialist (e.g. the Yuan, Ming and Qing colonization of Yunnan, the Qing colonization of Xinjiang, and so on). CCP policy is essentially to restore the borders of the Qing Empire. Calling this policy passive is a joke.

    I never said Chinese New Zealanders were going to take over New Zealand. They don't need to though. We are already so deluded by dreams of gold and nightmares of 'offending China' that China has been calling the shots for some time.

    It's embarrassing. Like every other nation in the world we are selling out our principles in the hope of making a buck. The joke is that Chinese state meddling to protect Chinese industries, criminal behavior on the part of our Chinese 'business partners', obstruction and persecution of foreign business in China by local authorities, the basic Chinese xenophobia that sees ripping off foreigners as patriotism, and much more, mean we will be lucky to come out with more than we would have had if we had acted with a little integrity.

    Auckland • Since May 2008 • 49 posts Report Reply

  • Seamus Harris,

    Jamil,

    I've heard it said before that New Zealand firms should be getting stuck in and helping clean up China's environment. Sounds great in principle. A few years ago I had a look around for some NZ firms that might have this kind of expertise and found nothing much (from memory maybe one company specialized in cleaning up polluted water). Are there NZ firms with this type of environmental clean up expertise?

    It seems to me that China's pollution problems are unlike anything in New Zealand. I guess we could help them clean up agricultural pollution, but we probably need to learn how to do that ourselves first. We seem to be doing a crap job in our own backyard.

    Clean energy technologies? We just might have a real world leading technology in that firm doing bio-diesel from algae (last I checked the technology still had to be proven economic though). Other than that what do we have? The Chinese piss all over us in terms of wind power. Seen the huge wind farms out in Xinjiang? They are about to become a major force in solar panels (in fact they will no doubt be the ones who make solar panels an economic technology). Maybe there is some minor contribution we could make. But I hardly see clean energy as a New Zealand strength. I see us as lagging miles behind the rest of the world.

    Auckland • Since May 2008 • 49 posts Report Reply

  • Sam F,

    we are not talking about some nebulous fringe element here. We are talking about the majority of PRC-born New Zealanders. Moreover, the inexplicable personal bias in question is completely external to New Zealand.

    Seems remarkable enough to be worth commenting on.

    Sorry not to have mentioned on this earlier, but I thought we were actually commenting on the Herald's sample of 32 Chinese-ethnicity voters, of whom 20 were born in mainland China. That sample is being interpreted to represent 147,000 Chinese in NZ, of whom 80,000 were born in the PRC (all data from the 2006 census). Twenty people, whom the Herald was able to reach in adequate time to file a story before deadline.

    Furthermore, although we have some idea of those twenty voters' priorities with respect to Chinese MPs, we have no idea how they might be making decisions with respect to non-Chinese candidates. It takes very undemanding standards of proof to infer from the story that the majority of PRC-born voters will be casting their vote based upon loyalty to the PRC.

    I've just prepared and then deleted another paragraph of musings on Chinese identity vs. the Chinese government, because the issue's already fairly clear upthread. I'm going to need better than a 32-person sample to make further pronouncements about other people's identity politics from the safety of my keyboard.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1611 posts Report Reply

  • Seamus Harris,

    All good points Sam.

    I'm not predicting CCP influence in NZ is going to be changed in any way by the outcome of the comming election.

    Of course the survey is small and unscientific. That said, the interview comments were interesting, and the findings gel with my experiences of the PRC community in New Zealand.

    I merely thought the matter worth commenting on.

    The most important issue to me is how people (and this includes westerners as well as Chinese) censor themselves to avoid 'offending China', 'offending the CCP' and so on. We're seeing more and more of this and it is not good.

    Keeping silent to save CCP face has just hospitalized thousands of babies. The world needs less of this, not more.

    Auckland • Since May 2008 • 49 posts Report Reply

  • Sam F,

    It's been interesting seeing comment here too on the harm to NZ's reputation from the milk scandal. Anecdotal comment from friends and workmates (some of the latter being specialists in the China export trade) says that NZ has actually come fairly well out of it, and demand for NZ milk products amongst those who can afford them has remained very strong - it's recognised as an industry-wide problem in China, rather than being solely Sanlu/Fonterra, and NZ-made products are seen both as safer and as much higher quality than domestic equivalents.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1611 posts Report Reply

  • Seamus Harris,

    I think the main damage to Fonterra's and NZ's reputation will be outside China.


    Will be interesting to see how the Chinese government treats Fonterra in the aftermath of the thing though.

    Auckland • Since May 2008 • 49 posts Report Reply

  • mark taslov,

    Seamus, I agree with you re: the Greens in the main, We can talk about the history we can compare the imperialism of the mongolian yuan dynasty with the crusades or the ming's imperialism with the British, or we can talk about right now, the 2008 election, in the 21st century. hence

    Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue said Beijing was "worried and uneasy about the large-scale military build-up" in the Gulf region.

    "I think our position is extremely close to that of France," she said.

    http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/east/01/23/sprj.irq.china/index.html

    as opposed to

    Our nation enters this conflict reluctantly -- yet, our purpose is sure. The people of the United States and our friends and allies will not live at the mercy of an outlaw regime that threatens the peace with weapons of mass murder. We will meet that threat now, with our Army, Air Force, Navy, Coast Guard and Marines, so that we do not have to meet it later with armies of fire fighters and police and doctors on the streets of our cities.

    http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030319-17.html

    which seems a little back to front imo.

    You can bring Taiwan into your argument, but the NZ government doesn't recognize the government of the ROC.

    http://www.mfat.govt.nz/Countries-and-Territories/Taiwan.php

    So with regards to Taiwan, differentiating the NZ gov policy and the CCP policy in the 21st century, is splitting hairs.

    Mark my words seamus The oft repeated idea that China has a history of pacifism irks me too. those 20,000 poorly armed chinese serviceman killed in that brief foray into nam in 78? were totally sold down the river.

    But what you're talking about is the rather short sighted phenomena that is 3 year term democracy. and looking back 3/6/9 years we're not seeing much imperialistic expansion from the CCP under the current admin. What we hae seen is 9% annual growth, the same kind of growth that Key is teasing NZ voters with today.

    I've never bought any petrol, so it's not really my business, but the situation as seems to work something like this, new announcement of attack in iraq=immediate hike in petrol prices. That's danger money and not a situation anyone should be encouraging.

    simplified it seems the choices are simple, you could either encourage democracy and fair representation or not, for whatever reasons, whether you agree or disagree, if you don't, then you're no less nationalistic or xenophobic than those you chastise,

    the chinese know better than most that the fastest way to a person's heart is cold cash, hence the recent election in taiwan of a rather pro PR china president.

    so either by way of the front door or the back door, the chinese powers that can have and will find ways to influence the New Zealand Government and in my way of thinking i'm happier there is a candidate who has been voted in singularly because of their ties to the PRC mainly for accountability and transparency.

    And more to the point it's not like legislation like the suppression of terrorism act and the electoral finance act don't already smell like a shift in democratic principles towards the totalitarianism and censored politicizing of the CCP. So how did that happen?
    i want to see it in writing.

    this

    the basic Chinese xenophobia that sees ripping off foreigners as patriotism

    is exactly the kind of crying over spoilt milk that must be echoing around the fonterra boardrooms and the only significant way to overcome this hurdle and avoid being cheated in future is to come to terms with and educate ourselves about the chinese dao, so we can actually win a hand here and there, because it's not going to go away anytime soon. what could we learn from them?

    well, as you mentioned seamus

    The Chinese piss all over us in terms of wind power. Seen the huge wind farms out in Xinjiang? They are about to become a major force in solar panels (in fact they will no doubt be the ones who make solar panels an economic technology).

    It's embarrassing. Like every other nation in the world we are selling out our principles in the hope of making a buck.

    i think seamus, integrity is a many sided coin. you are going to have to sell your principles to someone in this world so you might as well get a good price for them.

    re: Sam on Jamil, yeah, i've been paranoid about fonterra/NZ connection of late, but what you're saying seems a far more accurate representation of word i hear on the street. fonterra? New zealand? but that was last month.

    Te Ika-a-Māui • Since Mar 2008 • 2281 posts Report Reply

  • stephen walker,

    I wonder what http://crikey.com.au Canberra correspondent Bernard Keane has got to say now?

    Do you reckon he reads the SMH? If so, he's in for a bigger shock than when the Aussie cricket team got thrashed by India the other day...

    World gives Aussie dollar a walloping

    The big fall in the Australian dollar prompted London's Financial Times to dub the currency the "whipping boy" of foreign exchange markets.

    speaking of currencies going down the gurgler...

    nagano • Since Nov 2006 • 646 posts Report Reply

  • jon_knox,

    I think the article Gareth Morgan wrote for the listener that David's original post references is this one, which wasn't available via the Listener site at the time.

    Belgium • Since Nov 2006 • 464 posts Report Reply

  • stephen walker,

    speaking of the metaphor in this post title...

    From the LA Times:

    First, Tao Shoulong burned his company's financial books. He then sold his private golf club memberships and disposed of his Mercedes S-600 sedan.

    And then he was gone.

    And just like that, China's biggest textile dye operation -- with four factories, a campus the size of 31 football fields, 4,000 workers and debts of at least $200 million -- was history.

    "We're pretty much dead now," said Mao Youming, one of 300 suppliers stiffed last month by Tao's company, Jianglong Group. Lighting a cigarette in a coffee shop here, the 38-year-old spoke calmly about the bleak future of his industrial gas business. Tao owed him $850,000, Mao said, about 60% of his annual revenue. "We cannot pay our workers' salaries. We are about to be bankrupt too."

    Government statistics show that 67,000 factories of various sizes were shuttered in China in the first half of the year, said Cao Jianhai, an industrial economics researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. By year's end, he said, more than 100,000 plants will have closed.

    nagano • Since Nov 2006 • 646 posts Report Reply

  • jon_knox,

    Here's a pretty reasonable telco sector assessment of the impacts of the credit crunch for those interested in Telco trends.

    Belgium • Since Nov 2006 • 464 posts Report Reply

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