China`s Miracle Growth Threatened by Crisis

“I cannot find a job at my hometown. I feel helpless.”

Liu Tenhung sighed deeply and hung his head down at the square in front of Guangzhou Station Sunday. Guangzhou is the capital of Guangdong province.

Liu, whose hometown is Gongan County in Jingzhou, Hubei province, worked at a leather bag factory in Guangzhou for three years. Along with 70 colleagues, he lost his job after the owner fell behind three months on payroll and ran away.

Liu barely has enough money to pay for a train ticket to his hometown. He can return to his hometown and meet his family next morning. He feels pressured instead of happy, however. He has only three patches of rice paddies back at his hometown, which will only allow him to earn less than 3,000 yuan (438 U.S. dollars) per year.

After midnight, the square in front of Guangzhou Station is full of peasant migrant workers headed for their hometowns.

As the global financial crisis forces Chinese companies to go bust, more peasant migrant workers are returning to their hometowns. Since China began opening its market and reforming its economy three decades ago, the nation has shown stellar economic growth.

With the industrial structure growing complex and the global economic crisis hitting the nation, however, China is facing the inevitable side effects of the business downturn.

Since China adopted market opening and reform 30 years ago, its economy has grown dramatically. Skyscrapers in Pudong, Shanghai, an area which had nothing but an expansive plain, surprised the world.

Over the past 30 years, China’s economy has grown 9.8 percent per year, and its trade volume has jumped a whopping 105 times and its GDP 47 times.

Based on its economic prowess, China now has a bigger say in politics and diplomacy related to the United States and Europe.

orionha@donga.com