Asian Development Outlook- April 2025
<p>Weak consumption in the People’s Republic of China will partly offset robust domestic demand in South Asia. Disinflation is expected to continue, driven by lower food and energy prices, along
China
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Fresh aftershocks in quake-hit areas
The police tried to stop anguished relatives from streaming into one of the worst affected areas of China's massive earthquake on Sunday, as another strong aftershock hit the area and the death toll rose to nearly 32,500. Hundreds of aftershocks have rattled Sichuan province following last Monday's devastating 7.9 magnitude quake, and officials are concerned the tremors could bring down more unstable buildings and rupture already leaky dams. Six days after the main quake hit, the overall death toll stands at nearly 32,500, state news agency Xinhua reported, with a further 220,000 injured.
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Lessons for India in China's scrap recycling
Recycling is an effective way of creating treasure out of waste at a fraction of the energy used in producing primary metals from minerals. Now that both ferrous and non-ferrous metals are ruling at historically high prices, the outlook for scrap recovery and metal production through the secondary route of melting of scrap has never been this good. Steel scrap deals are made at rates of over $600 a tonne.
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Revised texts on market access to be released today
Even as the current negotiations in the Doha Round of world trade talks on agriculture have entered a crucial phase, developed nations are trying to push their commercial interests in the farm sector, undermining the livelihood and food security issues of the developing countries like India. All eyes will be on the revised texts on agriculture and non-agriculture market access, which are likely to be released on Monday, to see how these issues are reflected in them.
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Change in China
In a system with a centuries-long tradition of austere leaders laying down the law from behind their palace walls, China's response to the worst natural disaster in 30 years revealed a nation in the throes of political change. The China that emerged from the wreckage of the 7.9 magnitude earthquake in Sichuan province looked surprisingly modern, flexible and if not democratic, at least open.
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Chinese Families Trek For Days To Find Quake Victims
On the buckled road to the epicentre of China's deadliest earthquake in decades, the stream of refugees fleeing collapsed homes and unburied corpses is almost outnumbered by a flow of anxious families trekking in. The town of Wenchuan and hundreds of smaller settlements have been cut off from traffic and telephones since the massive tremor on Monday which Beijing say may have killed more than 50,000.
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China Mourns Earthquake Victims
China began three days of national mourning on Monday for more than 30,000 victims of an earthquake that struck a week ago. Public entertainment will be suspended, flags kept at half-mast and a three-minute silence observed to mark exactly a week since the quake, the government said. The national flag in Tiananmen Square in central Beijing flew at half mast after a ceremony at dawn. The Olympic torch relay, currently on its domestic leg ahead of the Aug. 8 opening in Beijing, will likewise be suspended for three days.
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China firm set to build dam to meet city's water needs
A Chinese state-run firm is all set to become the first from the country to build a dam in India, which aims to ease the drinking water shortage in the country's financial capital Mumbai. Despite some critics raising the bogey of the security implications of such a project, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has selected a joint venture between China International Water and Electric Engineering (CWE) and India's Soma Enterprises for constructing the Middle Vaitarna dam across the Vaitarna river, about 145 km from Mumbai, sources told The Indian Express.
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Now, threat of lake burst
Thousands of persons are being evacuated from around a lake and a river at risk of bursting in south-west China's earthquake-affected zone, said relief officials on Saturday. The disaster relief headquarters in the Beichuan County said it received reports of water levels reaching danger point at the Laoyingyan section of the Qianjiang River on Saturday. The river has been blocked by landslips caused by the earthquake. "It hasn't burst yet, but we asked people to leave because we need to prepare for the worst,' said an official.
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Quake rocks China's insurance sector, damages touch $20 bn
The most powerful earthquake in China since 1950 shows the nation's insurance industry is decades behind those of the world's biggest economies. Just 5 per cent of the more than $20 billion of damages from the quake in Sichuan province is covered by insurance, according to estimates from an official at the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, who declined to be identified.
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Cementing its way
Bihani Cement Ltd, the flagship company of the Braj Binani Group, which has interests in cement, zinc and fibre glass, is growing globally. "We are trying to replicate what Anil Agarwal did to Vedanta," says Vinod Junej a, deputy managing director, Binani Cements.