China Begins to Strengthen Supervision on Sorghum Imports

The surging US sorghum trade with China could face a clampdown from authorities in Beijing, who are trying to reduce domestic grain inventories, US agricultural officials have warned.

The Chinese government had “begun to pay close attention to the rapid increase in sorghum imports, and some policy makers reportedly believe these imports make it harder for the government to dispose of its large corn stocks”, according to the latest China grains report from the Beijing bureau of the US Department of Agriculture.

China’s sorghum imports jumped in the year to September 2014, increasing more than sixfold to 4.2m tonnes from the previous year and are forecast to double to 8.5m tonnes in the 12 months to 2015, with the bulk of the commodity coming from the US.

The report from Beijing warned that the numbers could change due to stricter testing of sorghum shipments.

“import officials have recently begun to enhance inspections, and traders are voicing concern that the government may be getting ready to take more concerted action to limit imports,” it said.

News of the USDA warning was first reported by Agrimoney.com.

The surge in demand for sorghum comes as the Chinese government’s grain purchases under its agricultural support programme have pushed up domestic prices for corn.

Feed mills have been importing cheaper alternatives, including sorghum and barley, which are also not subject to official import quotas.

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"Internet + Commodity" to Change Industry Rules

"'Internet + commodities' action plan will change the business model and game rules of commodity markets, leading the industry to re-shuffle, to create an upgraded version of the commodity markets, and to boost our ability to fix commodity prices." The head of the securities Futures Institute of Beijing Technology and Business University Hu Yuyue recently said.

"Internet +" represents a new form of economy that fully optimizes and integrates the role of the Internet in the allocation of production factors, puts the Internet innovation into all areas of economic, and improves creativity and productivity of the real economy.

Across the globe, since the financial crisis, the United States resorted to its first-mover advantage of the Internet economy to vigorously promote the "Internet industry" and to accelerate the integration of Internet technology and traditional manufacturing. As a leader in the European economy, Germany, will promote "Industry 4.0" as a national strategy, which in essence is the integration of information technology and the next-generation manufacturing.

Hu Yuyue believes that Internet technology can achieve a virtuous cycle of information and sharing mechanisms to make mutual influence and mutual coordination among spot, forwards, futures prices and forge fair "anchor price", which is the key to our country to compete in commodity pricing.

"Through the form of the Internet, we can effectively integrate the market resources, streamline commodity circulation order and establish organic links among the layers and levels of market, we should extend down the futures market, upward the spot market, cultivate the OTC market, and form futures and spot docking, inside and outside the docking, online and offline docking, commodity and financial docking, domestic and foreign docking multi-level commodity market system. "Hu Yuyue said.

Let’s take the "Internet + steel" for example, in 2013, steel spot trading platform Shanghai Steel silver project was officially launched, it has covered the Bohai Sea, Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta region for just two years, and continues to head to the Central of China.

The vice president of Shanghai Steel unio and the general manager of steel silver Bai Rui recently said, we were designed to provide the whole process solutions for the steel industry chain, to create a "seamless steel trading platform" including the spot trading, logistics, online financing, payment and supporting services, it has been involved throughout the steel products in sectors of the trading of goods consignment model, like payment, delivery, billing and other secondary transactions, the "internet + steel" model has universally been recognized. Until April 2015, the daily settlement amount of silver steel business platform has reached 66,593 tons.

Hu Yuyue pointed out that the electronic commodities trading market was an upgraded version of the spot trading, the next line was now one of three non-standard (on-site, cash, cash) transactions upgraded to relatively standardized online trading. It’s suitable to trade commodities online due to commodities’ features - industrialization, marketization, intensiveness, large scale, and standardization. 

"'Internet + commodities' action plan, is not simply electronic transactions, but the combination with the financial services, logistics as well as upstream and downstream businesses together to form a complete industry ecosystem, to make multi-party enterprises embrace Internet and to integrate the whole industry chain, thus the efficiency of resource allocation will be increased, the existing commodity pricing rules will be changed, which will help us fight for commodity pricing. "Hu Yuyue represented.

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China and India Cooperate in Many Aspects of Economy and Trade

From May 14 to 16, Indian Prime Minister Modi will be his first official visit to China after taking office, which is also an important high-level interaction between the two countries after Chinese President Xi Jinping's visit last September. With "one belt one road" strategy’s further development and India into AIIB, Modi's visit sparked widespread concern of overseas media. Among them, the high-speed rail cooperation and the trade deficit cut has become a hot topic in the field of economy and trade.

Reuters reported that China was conducting a feasibility study on the high-speed rail project, and asked India to start a pilot project in some sections. New Delhi to Chennai high-speed rail project will cost $36 billion. "Both sides also agreed to accelerate to implement the planned Chennai-to-Bengaluru high-speed rail corridor. Since Modi wants to updat India’s crumbling railway system which every day 25 million people used, China may get this opportunity."

Agence France Presse reported that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi would visit China next week, aimed at balancing the trade deficit with China. It reported that China is India's largest trading partner, the two-way trade volume approached 70 billion US dollars (about 434.36 billion yuan). However, according to Indian statistics, India's trade deficit with China has soared from $ 1 billion (about 6.21 billion yuan) (2001 to 2002) to over 40 billion US dollars (about 248.2 billion yuan)

The report quoted the expert opinion that Modi must achieve the bilateral trade target towards $100 billion through seeking more Chinese market this year, thus eliminating the trade deficit.

Le Yucheng, Chinese ambassador to India, also said that the two countries would sign an cooperation agreement worth $10 billion.

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China and Belarus Sign Billions-of-dollar Economic Agreements

When Chinese President Xi Jinping paid a state visit to Belarus in Eastern Europe, China and Belarus yesterday signed a series of economic agreements worthy of billions of dollars.

"China Daily" quoted from Zhang Dong, the deputy Eurasian director of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, during Xi’s visit to Belarus, both countries signed nearly 20 economic cooperation agreements, worth about $15.7 billion.

People's Bank of China and the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus signed a bilateral currency swap agreement - 7 billion yuan / 16 trillion Belarusian rubles, valid for three years. This agreement will facilitate bilateral trade and investment and promote bilateral economic development.

China Development Bank also provided Belarus Development Bank with a 15-year low-interest loans of $ 700 million, and agreed to extend the 300-million-dollar loan period for Belarus ASB Bank. 

When Xi Jinping talked with the President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko on Sunday, he agreed to take measures to expand bilateral trade scale and confirmed the sino-Belarus industrial park of 80 square kilometers was a strategic project. Xi also encouraged Chinese companies to invest in the park and set up high-tech enterprises.

Sino-Belarus industrial park is near the Ming Gdansk airport, with the planning area 91.5 square kilometers, which is the largest investment project in Belarus, but also the largest economic and technological cooperation project between China and Belarus.

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April’s imports and exports fall

General Administration of Customs released the latest data, in April the import and export is in the negative growth. In this regard, on May 9th, the Ministry of Commerce spokesman Sun Jiwen said that this year, China's foreign trade situation was more complex and challenging, and under downward pressure. It’s estimated that the foreign trade in the second half of year is better than the foreign trade in the first half of year.

In April, import and export value amounted to 1.96 trillion yuan, down by 10.9%. Among this, exports 1.08 trillion yuan, down by 6.2%; imports 873.9 billion yuan, down by 16.1%; trade surplus 210.21 billion yuan, expanding 85.2%.

In April, imports and exports went down again, the industry generally believes that weak external demand and higher real effective exchange rate is the main cause of weakness in exports, while sharply cut in commodity prices led to a continuation of the negative growth in imports.

imports continuously went down for six months due to the sharp cut in imported goods. Sun Jiwen pointed out that in the first four months, China's crude oil and other commodities importing volume increased, but importing value deceased, which made importing growth dro by 8%.

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Xi Jinping Visits Belarus and Signs Bilateral Cooperation Agreements

"I sincerely hope that this visit will sow the seeds of hope for the China-Belarus relations, and benefit both countries’ people." The Chinese president Xi Jinping said when he arrived in Minsk on the morning of 10th May Local time.

This is the first time for China’s head of state to pay a state visit to Belarus in 14 years. In the Independence Palace of winner street, Xi Jinping and Lukashenko held talks, signed a friendly cooperation treaty and joint statement on further development and deepening the comprehensive strategic partnership, witnessing the signature of bilateral cooperation documents regarding cultural, economic, technological, educational, regional cooperation and other areas.　　

There was a white long table and two white chairs on the left side of the head’s table, there were a think pile of agreements with red cover. Concierge staff guided more than twenty Chinese and Belorussian signatories in white, and made them two lines according to the contract order.

It’s the first time to see this scene, even for President Lukashenko.

"In this independent house, we have witnessed many historical events occurred, but it is the first time we see people lined up to sign the document, which is really exciting! ...... Tomorrow we will attend the opening ceremony of the local economic and trade cooperation forum with the Chairman Xi, both sides will sign a series of specific cooperation agreements. There is no doubt that these agreements between our two countries will promote pragmatic cooperation and exchanges and bring tangible benefits to two countries’ people. "

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Global Tourism Competitiveness Report: Spain Ranks First

On the 6th May, the Geneva-based World Economic Forum released 2015 Tourism Competitiveness Report, Spain ranked first in the world for the first time to become the world's most powerful country regarding the tourism competitiveness, China ranked No. 17.

The report made a survey in 141 global economies, it was aimed by index analysis to measure the potential of each country to create economic and social benefits through the development of tourism. In Asian countries, Japan, with a wealth of cultural resources, improved infrastructure and first-class digital economy, ranked ninth in the world rankings. Another eight Asian countries entered the top 50 list, including Singapore (ranking11), China (17), Malaysia (25), Thailand (35) and Indonesia (50).

It was reported that, although the current top ten countries are still traditional popular tourist countries such as Spain, France, Germany, the United States, Britain, Switzerland, Australia, Italy and Canada, tourism competitiveness gap between developed and emerging economies is gradually narrowing. With the growing number of international tourists and the growing the middle class tourist group, East Asia has become the world's most dynamic tourist hot spot. Meanwhile, from 2013 to 2014, Southeast Asia was the world's fastest-growing tourist region.

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