Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - July 25, 1979, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg free july 1979 7 peking lifts veil on economic Outlook by Linda Mathews Washington lifting a blackout that lasted two has finally Given the world a revealing look at its economic in a startling series of economic the peking government has in recent weeks disclosed everything from the size of its budget and Trade deficit to its annual output of bicycles and soap matters that had Long been classified As state the state statistical an Agency dismantled during the cultural revolution and Only recently even reported the number of records set by chinese athletes in there were 171 of them the Bureau five world Marks and the rest thousands of figures poured out of China during the recent notional peo Ples As the leadership peeled the wraps off the National the latest production quotas and economic targets for the current 20 years since reports not since when the chinese extolled the achievements of the communist regimes first decade in a re port called ten great had China published its full financial a foreign diplomats and economists who have Long specialized in piecing together the fragments of information released by the new China news Agency were elated that peking has finally emerged from its economic dark As a Central intelligence Agency Bulle tin phrased China is no longer quite so mystery and in glad of though this new Candor May put some of us out of an american analyst Ive spent half my life trying to figure out what was happening in China Here it after subjecting the new statistics to intensive the state department and the Cia have pronounced them we have quibbles with some of the and there Are others wed like to understand but there is no reason to doubt their a government analyst pork Leader what emerges from the new revelations is a portrait of a country that leads the world not Only in population 958 million but in Grain and pork production As peking Industrial output also commands for it appears that despite antiquated machinery and obsolete technology China now ranks third in Coal fifth in steel and among the top 10 in crude the chinese Economy has recovered substantially from the political turmoil and ideological strife of the past dec in the two and a half years since the death of Mao foreign Trade has boomed per state revenues have gone up 44 per cent and personal income has risen dramatically across the despite the worst drought in More than a Chi Nese Farmers last year harvested a record setting Grain crop of 304 million yet it is also Clear from the numbers that China has far to go if it is Ever to achieve its ultimate goal of transform ing itself into an industrialized Power by the end of the the chinese have made tremendous but theirs is still basically a very poor Robert Dern a University of Michigan econ foreign visitors have always been taken to Model communes and so Many people May be surprised to find from these latest just How poor China really the state statistical Bureau report for that the average City Dweller earned Only in despite a seven per cent pay yet factory and office workers fared far better than chivas 800 million who averaged Only in Cash income last the figures alone May exaggerate slightly the economic plight of the average for Urban rents Are food prices Are stabilized by the government and the peasants receive of their income in the form of Grain and but after paying for rent and groceries there is not much left in a chinese family budget for discretionary spending about per person for All of they go without even when a family of four pools that extra a year will not pay for a Wristwatch or an electric fan let alone a bicycle in a new Winter coat for each family member would wipe out the family budget the cheapest jackets of heavy padded Cotton Cost nearly the size of the National budget also underscores chivas the government spent a total of billion last year less than was spent by the department of education and among government analysts there was Little Surprise that chinese Assembly lines turned out Only motor vehicles last year compared to about nine million in the United states for China has not yet lost its heart to the but China managed to produce Only million peking leaving Long waiting lists for that prize commodity in every major the Economys combined with alarming population has meant Little appreciable improve ment in the Standard of Hua communist party acknowledged recently in a speech to the National Peoples de spite sizable he aver age food rations Are no higher now than they were in the even failures disclosed the while unfolding this Panorama of has been unexpectedly Blunt about the failures that have been we have achieved far less than we should Hua almost 30 years have passed since the founding of the Peoples yet to this Day the superiority of socialism has not been consistently and effectively brought into he blamed the recent setbacks on the gang of the doctrinaire but added that with the radicals re moved from Power there was no further excuse for the failings of the chinese in the hardest hitting Section of the Hua we have finally created the internal and external conditions favourable for peaceful con if we do not make use of this hard won generation will be unworthy of our country and our we will have failed in our duty to the cause of socialism in China and the there has been speculation that the chinese have put their statistical House in order because they Are ready to join the International monetary the asian development Bank and the world such International a potential source of Loans for the credit hungry demand full financial accounting As a condition of spokesmen for the monetary fund and the world Bank Here said they know of no formal membership application from though the Chi Nese have told visiting including a that they Are eager to join those embarrassed by Mao a further reason for chivas decision to reveal All or nearly All is that the new leadership has been embarrassed by the blackout Mao imposed after the failures of his Over am bilious great leap Forward in the late because of the pressure to make the great leaps backyard steel furnaces and hastily organized communes look trumped up figures were not since when the chinese extolled the achievements of the communist regimes first decade in a report called ten great has China published its full financial reported by local when these were challenged by senior statisticians and by foreign Mao silenced the the chinese admit that they got a terrible Black Eye because they didst disclose the very Basic data thai other countries routinely Dern the Michigan there was always the implication that this important country do what a lot of tiny Little countries most of the new figures Are consid ered but chivas defense Bud said to be billion in arouses some although finance minister Zhang Yingfu projected that military spending would increase this year to billion because of the Cost of chivas invasion of Vietnam and account for on sixth of the National some defense spending is probably disguised by appropriations for science and pegged at billion this the finance acknowledged in his budget address to the Peoples Congress that chivas grow ing appetite for foreign technology Means that the country will run up a deficit of nearly billion this this disclosure was a daring for in balanced Trade has often been a political As Well As an economic the current by admitting a opens itself up to the charge that it is becoming Overly dependent on foreign in Viola Tion of maoist the los Angeles times captains stay aboard sinking ships until the last Crew member has it the British foreign office apparently Felt no twinge of conscience when it ordered its am1 Bassadore in Al the Achilles papa Home to Britain and told staff of three to go on their Hasty coming just after the of two British Bankers kidnapped last no vember by Urban evoked an Over dramatic reaction from the 50 or so britons left in Al emergency Drill they were reported to be preparing an Early warning Emer gency Drill in Case of earthquakes or civil disorder although even Brit Ains Al purpose min embassies offer Little in the Way of earthquake predict the foreign office blithely insisted that there was nothing surprising in the mass diplomatic Holiday the ambassador had served his and the staff badly needed a rest after seven months of gruelling bargaining to secure the kidnapped britons but it is not Normal practice to leave an embassy so suddenly the three staff explains the foreign office All had to go on leave simultaneously because none of them can do his Job without the the three Are due to return in a matter of that unless the ambassador advises the foreign office to wind up the Post that decision depends on whether Britain has anything useful left to do in Al Salvador now that most British businessmen have disappeared Over the volcanoes to quieter the Security of the in a country where embassy Row looks like Dodge City the Costa rican and venezuelan embassies have All been attacked by guerrillas will also be a there would be nothing exceptional about leaving the earthquake Pat rollers of Al Salva Dor with no permanent diplomatic staff our men in both nearby Nicara Gua and Honduras Are one and the same and live in Costa reputation will suffer so so yet if British interests really have become negligible in Al the Mission should be wound Down embassies also exist to Fly the Flag and the sight of it disappearing Over the next Hill at the first whiff of guerrilla grape shot will not do the remnant of Britain reputation in Central America much terrorists in latin America and else where might also conclude that the British foreign office was a soft and be tempted to Kidnap a Diplomat to test Britain of repeated policy of refusing to make concessions to terror Al Salvador has become even less Safe for foreign nationals than before because Lloyds Bank International paid a Large reportedly for the release of the kidnapped Brit companies with offices overseas should look Long and hard at their current practice of taking out Kidnap insurance at Lloyds in London in order to be Able to pay up when their executives Are firms suy that executives would refuse to go to dangerous postings abroad unless they knew their companies would pay to get them after hearing of the lungs Ransom paid in Al Money starved terrorist groups throughout latin America Are liable to reach for the Lloyds Bank International handbook listing its Over seas the economist by William Claiborne m1noo Iran for Cen this Sandy islet in the Shatt Alarab River Between Iraq and Iran has been an arms smugglers it is covered with thick Palm forests in which traders can elude Nosy Cus Toms agents and army Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi be came so frustrated Over the furtive Trade that he once ordered the Kuzes Tan Power authority to install High in Tensity arc lights along the but the Arab iranian resident were not first they tapped the Power lines for their own sub Rosa electrification program and then shot out the arc lights so they could smuggle in the safety of with ethnic arabs in the Oil Rich province of Khuze Stan demanding autonomy following the islamic revolution that toppled the trading in smuggled weapons is booming More than Ever and revolutionary guards of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini have responded with harsh crackdowns in an Effort to keep smuggled arms away from militant arabs on the heavily armed Pyi Rols have been searching Homes and digging up ground in Hopes of uncovering arms feelings Are running High among the Island who say they have been trading for generations with family members and fellow tribesmen across the Shatt islamic provisional government officials say the which include soviet made Kalashnikov assault rifles and rpg7 handheld rocket Are being sold to members of the Khaliq a leftist separatist movement that has been accused of much of the sabotage and terrorism that has swept this southwestern iranian province in recent the Washington Post another match wont theres a simple lesson that Bob Banman has yet to learn you dont put out a political Bushfire by throwing in another As minister responsible for the Manitoba development Corpora is the Man who is looking after tenders for the Sale of Mckenzie seeds the governments decision to put the firm up for Sale has touched off a minor political especially in the bran Don area where a lot of people still remember the conservative election pledge not to sell Mckenzie leading the fight against the Sale is the nip opposition which claims it could jeopardize the jobs of 250 people and a payroll of opposition Leader Howard Pawley and nip economics critic Len Evans maintain that since most of the firms Market is in Ontario and Quebec and Alice Krueger seeds for packaging Are a new owner would Likely Transfer the Brandon operation to the in an attempt to diffuse opposition to the Banman last week promised he would tie Down the company in such a Way that it would be impossible for any new owner to move that would be done by Way of a contract which would contain a clause giving the go verment first rights to buy Back the see packaging firm if its new owners tend to move it out of the but rather than provide the Promise of a buyback clause has raised a lot More questions the main one being Why sell the company in the first place the clause As described by Banman appears totally it Guaran tees what Assurance is there the govern ment would exercise its right to buy Back if the new owners tried to move out of the province having been betrayed Many Brandon residents now feel the government cant be Trust what happens if the firm goes bankrupt under its new owners would the government still want to buy Back the firm suffered heavy losses in the Early and has Only shown profits in the past two at what Price would the govern ment be buying Back would it be current Price or something 10 be deter mined Down the Road what Assurance does the Public have that it would be a fair Price and where would a restraint con scions government like the Lyon administration find the Money to buy Back Mckenzie ban mans promised buyback clause Hast stilled the if any it just gave the nip another go at the there is a curious Sid Issue to the Mckenzie and that is the response of Brandon mayor Ken he has said the Issue is too political for icy Council for someone so loathe involve himself in things How Pray Tell did this Man Ever become mayor the Job of mayor is not some lighthearted Little game of tiddly whether Burgess likes it or its politics in which Hes involved and the possible loss of a major indy by should be of grave concern to him in his capacity As Brandon the Mckenzie seed Plant makes a significant contribution to the Brandon Economy and its passing strange the mayor int in there putting Forth the strongest possible opposition to the the fact he has chosen to remain silent might even be interpreted As political by we All Gripe about Winnipeg from time to time the the Lack of the Street the deteriorating the one thing we seem to take for granted is the Low crime rate and its not until you go elsewhere that you realize How Good things really Are at greatest life employee Lorraine Cairns arid about 30 other Winni Eggers found out what its like to live in a High crime rate area when they attended the International conference at earlier this there were not less than four locks on the hotel room reports who stayed at the Denver Hil As All stairwells in the hotel were locked because they had become a favorite spot for she said convention delegates were also warned not to venture out on the streets with their name rags because youre a sure one Delegate didst take the advice and was mugged while out for a lunch hour it Doest Hurt us to be aware of these things when were travelling else said sometimes were too trusting when were away ;