Breaking Waves
- Business Beyond the Reef is still apparently banned in China, but I’m in good company – according to the South China Morning Post. Harvard’s Isaac Mao Xianghui said last week that Chinese censors routinely block more than 95% of blog posts. The researcher said there should be nearly 73 million blog posts daily, but Beijing only allows access to about three million. The blocked sites include FaceBook, Picassa and YouTube, so I am in good – if not exclusive – company. A friend in Beijing tried again this week to see BBR, but no dice.
- I never considered a haircut as an internationally tradeable commodity, but apparently it is. Noted Hong Kong coiffeurist (is that a word?) was recently flown to North Korea for a private meeting with Dear Leader Kim Jong-Il. Apparently the true purpose of the trip, all at the expense of one of the world’s poorest countries, was a haircut for Kim Jong-Un, one of the Dear Leader’s sons. I’d say it was the North Korean people who got the haircut.
- China is planning to end some of the export rebates that have caused so much of a trade policy headache for Beijing. These are sizable rebates (9% on some steel products) that have prompted other countries to apply countervailing, antidumping or safeguard measures against Chinese products. The steel rebates are to end July 15. Additionally, the 5% rebate for corn starch, ethanol, copper products, lead products and zinc products will be ended.
This entry was posted
on Friday, June 25th, 2010 at 6:37 am and is filed under China, Korea.
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