China’s GOP Going Strong in 2009

Posted by Stan on 7/21/09 • Categorized as China Business & Economy

Slightly misleading post title. There are two reasons for this:

  1. There is absolutely no substantive news out there at the moment, and I’m reduced to petty tricks to draw in readers.
  2. Misleading people is fun.

Seriously, outside feels like an oven, lots of folks are on holiday for the summer, and news organizations are focusing on minutiae and the bizarre.

Or the road seldom travelled. Case in point is this Shanghai Daily article about China’s GOP. Yes, China does have a GOP, and apparently it is not only doing very well, thank you, in 2009 (compared to the U.S. GOP), due to several factors including initiatives with local governments, but the future also looks rosy for China’s GOP as well.

In the spirit of the whimsical (i.e. incredibly bored) mood I’m in, I will wait until after the jump to provide an explanation. Suckers.

That decision you just made to click on that “Read more” link was probably not such a great idea. Please keep in mind that nowhere did I actually, explicitly, recommend that you do so.

However, since you’re already here, you probably want to know that China’s “GOP” does not refer to a “Grand Old Party” but rather to China’s Gross Ocean Product, a subset of GDP that incorporates production of ocean-based natural resources, related services, etc.

I’ve never heard of this before, and since it’s always fun to pass along statistics that most of us don’t care about, here you go:

China’s gross ocean product (GOP) topped 1.386 trillion yuan (US$202.96 billion) in the first half, according to an initial assessment by the State Oceanic Administration (SOA).

The figure represented an increase of 6.9 percent over the same period last year, accounting for 9.91 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP).

Hey, you learn something new every day, huh?


2 Comments

  1. Brooke Carter
    Wednesday, July 22, 2009 • 7:14 pm

    Stan, did you see CDE’s comments on GDP? Reckoned its not so good and next year will be difficult: http://www.china-briefing.com/news/2009/06/22/caution-over-china%e2%80%99s-2009-gdp-figures-2010-is-the-real-test.html
    I’m starting to think the old boy may be onto something.

    • Stan
      Wednesday, July 22, 2009 • 7:20 pm

      I agree with his comments too. Lots to be worried about these days. Was the stimulus a good idea? Yes. Has it created some bubbles that may be unsustainable? Probably. Is the Chinese economy on a glide-path towards sustainable growth without serious reliance on exports to US/EU that may not be forthcoming for a couple of years? I doubt it.

      When the training wheels come off the economy next year, we’ll see what happens.