1st November 08

The Age

China smelter part of big BHP picture

BHP Billiton will process nearly half of the copper concentrate from its Olympic Dam mine expansion in South Australia and will ship the rest to a new, dedicated smelter in China. Project director Ted Bassett yesterday provided long-awaited details about the five-stage development.

Bursting of bubble hits Chinese middle class
John Garnaut and Maya Li, Sanhe, China

Tens of millions of Chinese have never known house prices to go in any direction but up. They are now watching in horror as the first housing boom of modern China turns into the inaugural bust. The slide began a year ago in Shenzhen, across the border from Hong Kong. This year the falls spread north to Guangzhou and up the coast to Xiamen and Shanghai, before heading along the Yangtze River to Nanjing, Wuhan and Chongqing and north to Beijing, Tianjin and Shenyang

International Herald Tribune

China's contaminated food scandal widens

Chinese regulators said Friday that they were widening their investigation into contaminated food amid growing signs that an industrial chemical called melamine has leached into the nation's animal feed supplies, posing health risks to consumers. The announcement came after food safety tests this week found that eggs produced in three provinces in China were contaminated with melamine, which is blamed for causing kidney stones and renal failure in infants. The tests have led to recalls of eggs and consumer warnings

Asia Times Online

China's footprint in Myanmar expands
By Brian McCartan

CHIANG MAI - Once under the radar in mostly remote areas, China's growing investments in resource-rich Myanmar have become more openly apparent as Beijing parlays its close diplomatic ties to the country's ruling military junta into lucrative contracts and concessions. China's commercial advance comes while the United States and Europe impose strict trade and investment sanctions against the military regime.

China ties up Russia's crude - again
By John Helmer

MOSCOW - After years of on-off negotiations and recriminations between Beijing, Moscow and Tokyo, Russia's state pipeline company Transneft agreed this week to complete construction of a pipeline to deliver crude oil between Skovorodino, in southeastern Siberia, and Daqing, the oilfield and refinery hub in northeast Heilongjiang, in China. The agreement, signed during Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's visit to Moscow to meet with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, will be sweetened by up to US$15 billion in long-term Chinese credits for Russian state oil producer Rosneft, and up to $12 billion to Transneft.