China’s Belt and Road Initiative criticized for poor standards and ‘wasteful’ spending

South China Morning Post ^ | 06/13/2019 | Teddy Ng

[SeekAndFind]

China’s massive infrastructure spending in Southeast Asian nations under the Belt and Road Initiative has run into a series of problems including substandard work and money wasted on unprofitable projects, a new report has warned.

The Belt and Road Initiative, launched by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013, encompasses an estimated US$1 trillion of projects – many of which are road and rail links – in more than 125 countries.

But the initiative has been overshadowed by controversy, including persistent warnings that poorer countries will be burdened with unsustainable debts and claims that Beijing is using it to extend its geopolitical influence – claims the Chinese government has denied.

The report by the Asia Society, a non-profit educational organisation, suggested a series of measures to improve the initiative, including setting up a fund to enable less-developed countries to mitigate risks and launching proper environmental assessments.

The study, released on Wednesday, said that in Southeast Asia Chinese officials had adopted a “laissez-faire” attitude towards enforcing standards, often citing the principles of “non-interference” to distance themselves from unpopular projects.

It cited the case of villagers in Laos who had been forced to leave their homes to make way for the Kunming to Vientiane railway. The report said Chinese project managers had made no effort to win support from locals or ensure they were properly resettled and compensated.

[SeekAndFind]

As an example, The Study also warns that villagers in Laos are being evicted from their homes without proper compensation to make way for a rail link.

“There are numerous documented incidents of villagers being forced to leave their homes without compensation as a result of the project,” the report said.

Chinese officials had also been pushing to sign off on projects quickly without undertaking due diligence, the report said.

The railway in Laos, for example, is estimated to cost US$5.95 billion, with the host country being liable for US$1.78 billion – or 12 per cent of its gross domestic product.

[headstamp 2]

[[But the initiative has been overshadowed by controversy, including persistent warnings that poorer countries will be burdened with unsustainable debts and claims that Beijing is using it to extend its geopolitical influence – claims the Chinese government has denied.]]

Geopolitical Loansharking.

[Mount Athos]

You can bribe a few officials to do things against their country’s interest.

Do those officials care when they put the country in terrible debt for projects that don’t make sense?
Same problem all over the world including here

[Lower Deck]

As interesting as the belts and roads article is the one that follows it, on how Chinese companies are moving production to Vietnam to avoid the trade war tariffs, is even more enlightening.

[DoughtyOne]

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Just $128.00 dollars to 98.00%

[Chainmail]

Two points:

1. This "Belts and Roads Initiative" is really the Chinese investing in military interconnectivity. It's the roads and seaway China intents to use and control during a major War. Think "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" and you have the idea.

2. China is expending huge sums of money to support this and the massive loans to the Third World to make it happen. Coupled with the Trump economic pressures - and China is facing economic collapse.

Gotta love the Plan!

[texas booster]

One of my lighting suppliers is already touting their Thai factory to get around tariffs.

Looks like all of their Chinese manufactured inventory is being sent to Thailand and will get new manufacturing stickers before the week is out.

[Cowboy Bob]

You can’t take over the world by stealing other people’s ideas and building inferior products. That can only take you so far...

[butlerweave]

The Chinese Communist party will make the sucker countries to pay for it anyway

[Yollopoliuhqui]

With better infrastructure, those poorer countries won’t be so poor any longer. That’s the entire point of the Lyndon LaRouche inspired Belt and Road initiative, something he’s been meeting European and Asian heads of state for since the mid 1980’s.