Asia

ISLAMABAD: The country’s exports to Afghanistan, China, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, India, Iran, Nepal, Bhutan and the Maldives account for a small amount of $4.590 billion — just 14.43pc of Pakistan’s total global exports of $31.79bn in FY22. China tops the list of Pakistan’s regional exports leaving other populous countries India and Bangladesh behind. Islamabad carried out trade with its farther neighbours Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Bangladesh and the Maldives via sea only. On the other hand, imports from these countries edged up to $17.814bn in FY22 against $13.826bn over the corresponding period last year, an increase of 28.84pc. Exports grew 17pc, but imports swelled close to $18 billion As a result of huge imports, Pakistan’s trade deficit with the region expanded during the ...

Beijing, China: According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the outlook for FDI in 2022 is "worrisome". International project finance in infrastructure sectors is expected to continue to provide growth momentum. Reports say that a new project activity in the first quarter of 2022 recorded a decrease of 21 per cent, and international project finance deals were down 4 per cent. The same trend is observed in BRI investments, as per European Times. According to a study by the Green Finance & Development Center, Chinese Belt and Road financing and investments, in the participating 147 countries of BRI fell in the first half of 2022. During the period financing and investments were recorded at USD 28.4 billion, compared with USD 29.4 billion ...

KARACHI: Inflation in the country has reached the record high in 14 years in this July. Consumer price index (CPI) inflation rose to 24.93 per cent in July, whereas in July 2021, it was recorded at 8.4 per cent, according to data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistic. That compares with a 21.3 per cent jump in June. This level was last seen in August 2008. On a month-on-month basis, CPI-based inflation increased 4.3 per cent in July 2022 as compared to an increase of 6.3 per cent in the previous month, and an increase of 1.3 per cent in July 2021. Over a decade ago, Pakistan experienced high and volatile inflation in FY2009, where July 2008 CPI increased to 24.3 per cent, and then in August of the same year, it increased to 25.3 per cent. Now in July 2022, it has again rea...

Port Louis, Mauritius:  The 3G network in Mauritius has been largely developed by Huawei.The issue of the allocation of contracts to Huawei under the era of Sherry Singh, the former Chief Executive Officer of Mauritius Telecom has pointed toward the unholy alliance between the executive and the Chinese government.Different stories are heard about the issue of the allocation of contracts to Huawei under the era of ex-CEO Sherry Singh.Huawei has been awarded worth hundreds of millions of rupees contracts during 2006-07, which skyrocketed to billions of rupees under Singh.In 2006-07, Huawei entered the national telecommunications company under the direction of the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Mauritius Telecom (MT) Sarat Lallah.During this same period, Huawei was entrusted wi...

Beijing, China:   Chinese bank depositors, who are protesting against their inability in getting their frozen funds back, are now boycotting the mortgage payment which in turn is increasing the non-performing assets (NPA) of the banks giving a major blow to the country's economy.China Evergrande Group, one of the largest property developers in the country by sales had promised to release an initial restructuring plan by the end of July, according to The Wall Street Journal.As of June 2021, Evergrande had more than USD 300 billion in debt and other liabilities, such as unpaid bills to suppliers. It defaulted on its dollar bonds in December, after months of liquidity problems, it reported further.There is a deep slump in the country's property market. China's ailing property market ...

Zambia has cancelled US$ 1.6 billion Chinese loans to void Beijing’s debt trap. The southern African country has also managed successfully in negotiating a $1.4 billion IMF bailout to restructure some $17 billion external debt. In November 2020, the country defaulted on a sovereign loan, and then in February 2021, Zambia applied to be considered under a newly established process set up by the G-20 called the “common framework” designed to help countries weather the storm of COVID-19 with debt relief and restructuring. China is Lusaka’s biggest bilateral lender and Zambia has an exceptionally high level of Chinese loan commitments. Zambia's debt to Chinese public and private lenders is $6.6 billion, almost double the amount disclosed by the previous Zambian government, th...

Chinese economy with a most educated generation is suffering to generate enough employment opportunities for its population. A bunch of factors has propelled unemployment among 16- to 24-year-old urbanites to a record 19.3%, more than twice the comparable rate in the US. China is aiming to transform the country into a more innovative and technologically advanced economy but about 15 million young people are estimated to be jobless, and many are lowering their ambitions. More young people taking roles in government may leave fewer jumping into new sectors and would also dampen innovation. Schooled at the most prestigious universities at home and abroad, top Chinese talent used to aim for Fortune Global 500 companies, large internet platforms, consulting agencies or law firms in cities s...

Islamabad, Pakistan: Economic unrest is increasing the difficulty for people of Pakistan. The economic crisis is nowhere to end. Rupee is depreciating with the economy which now is impacting the cost of production. Pakistan's economic outlook remained uncertain and blurry while inflation would stick around the current level of 21 per cent in the short term, said the Ministry of Finance on Thursday, amid the government's failure to stem rupee depreciation that was causing price hike, reported The Express Tribune. In its monthly economic outlook for July, the economic advisory wing underlined that the inflationary and external sector risks were building macroeconomic imbalances in the economy. "All these factors are making the economic outlook uncertain," stated the finance ministr...

Beijing, China:Shanghai Human Resources and Social Security Bureau on July 26 said that the openings are being offered by 259 postdoctoral programs run by 123 world-leading companies, top Chinese institutes and universities in the city, Shanghai Daily reported. The institutes and universities include Pujiang Laboratory, the Shanghai Institute of Technical Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Fudan University and COMAC.In May, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang underlined the importance of implementing policies for stabilising the economy and supporting market entities to bring the situation back to the normal track in an unusually stark warning that comes as COVID curbs have adversely impacted the second-largest economy. Keqiang had painted a grim p...

The bubble has burst. The phenomenal growth story of the Chinese economy is drawing to a close. After a Covid-induced 6.8 percent shrinkage of the economy in the first quarter of 2020, now in the second quarter of 2022 the growth rate has come down to just 0.4 percent. While a draconian lockdown imposed for a two-month period from March 2022 to May 2022 to enforce an overcautious zero – Covid policy could be the immediate reason between the latest fall in growth rate, the underlying malady could be much deeper; reasons like a slump in the real estate sector of the Chinese economy, a policy of inducing growth through investment in infrastructure that has little productive use and sinking of resources in bad investments overseas though the Belt and Road Initiative in an anxiety to make s...