How many 9/11s does it take to equal one China earthquake tragedy?

There were 2,974 people that died as an immediate result of the September 11, 2001 attacks, according to Wikipedia.

Estimations now suggest 50,000 Chinese may have perished in the China earthquake.

If that’s true, the answer is, it would take 16.8 9/11s to equal the earthquake death toll.

That should give you a little perspective on how much earthquake relief effort is needed.

Where is the help going to come from?

Corporations – with their big pocketbooks and vast resources – are likely candidates.

So, big guys, what ARE you doing? Tell us.

We are interested in running a series of profile stories on companies (SMEs too) that are heavily involved in the earthquake relief.

If you help run a company – or know someone who does – that is involved in earthquake relief, please tell us. This is a great chance for such companies to get some publicity for the great humanitarian work they’re doing. It’s also a way to share CSR success stories to help the China community know what works – and maybe what doesn’t – when it comes to allaying this and future tragedies.

If you have any information on company relief efforts, email us at editor@bizcult.com, or leave some comments below. Thanks!

While the ink has long since dried on the “new” Labor Contract Law, there still is some confusion surrounding the issue. It doesn’t help much that the official English translation is in the patented government Chinglish. Or maybe it’s just the legalese that’s throwing us.

Thankfully, our friend Steven Chow over at our sister site ChinaWhy, has posted an update of some of the major changes.

Here are some main points of concern regarding the new labor law, which both your firm and suppliers should be aware of:

• If money changes hands, it is often an employer-employee relationship. Sounds like a no-brainer, but the new law broadened the scope and definition of an employer so that no employee’s rights will slip through the cracks. No getting around these laws, so read on.
• No more damaging collateral. Who knew you needed collateral for things other than loans. Apparently employers previously collected ID cards or other private property when hiring workers to control them later. Sounds sketchy, and it is. Now it’s illegal.

Read More →

In such a racially homogeneous country such as China (about 92% of the population is Han Chinese, with minorities generally clustered away in the far corners of the country), it’s no surprise that there aren’t many standards of political correctness when it comes to inter-racial interactions.

This is less out of brazen disregard for others’ feelings, and more out of regard for Chinese history, in which foreigners have historically been seen as barbarians or imperialists.

Even though I feel like I am being inspected like a fish at the wet market sometimes on the subway, I know that this is tame for those of African descent, who are still much, much more of a novelty.

Even the professional, college-educated Chinese people I live with do not really understand blacks’ position in the world. They asked me the other day while watching a concert featuring two black performers on CCTV-something, why they had British accents, confused about the fact that any lived outside of America or Africa.

The cumulative effect of the lack of knowledge and experience the Chinese have had with blacks has led to many misperceptions, and thus discrimination, which extends to the office environment. The result isn’t just individual hardship experienced by black employees in China. Entire company performance can be affected. Read More →

Ok CSR people, it’s time to stop planting shrubs in the Olympic Garden.

After months – make that years - of mucking about trying to give the liberal world a good reason why you’re investing in a Sudan ally, a Tîbet suppressor and a human rights trampler, your deus ex machina has arrived.

China’s earthquake means you can now safely be involved in China as a corporate hero.

That is, if you act now!

Below are some suggestions, but put on your own charity thinking caps too.

• Help everyone. “Donate money to the Red Cross Society of China which has formed a disaster relief working group to be dispatched to the earthquake-stricken Wenchuan County in Sichuan,” according to Shanghaiist and China Law Blog.
• Help the orphans. Fortunately, none died in the Chengdu orphanage under the auspices of Care for Children. But the quake damage poses other dangers related to lack of sanitation, clean water, and potential disease outbreaks. Major construction work also is needed to repair facilities. “A CFC report from Robert Glover in Sichuan on the status of the 13 orphanages located around the epicenter of the quake showed six of them had sustained damage to their buildings: cracked walls, weakened foundations and broken facilities,” according to Dezan Shira & Associates, which supports the charity. Money can be donated to Care For Children through account numbers here. Donations should be marked “Earthquake Appeal.”
• “Long term, companies should look at providing long term support to aid, development, poverty alleviation, and reconstruction organizations - China Poverty Alleviation Fund, Woman’s Federation, Children’s Youth Development Fund, etc. as they will certainly be in need,” according to Richard Brubaker, managing director of China Strategic Development Partners, on his CSR website China-crossroads.com.

Read More →

The daily ironies of living in China have got to be one of the top reasons I find life here so enjoyable, and any expat who claims otherwise probably doesn’t have their eyes open. Or perhaps they’re just too fixated on the ladies here to recognize.

Where can you order a “grilled cheese” and literally find yourself face to face with a slab of melted cheese on a plate? *Cough, cough,* in a city that rhymes with Nanjing.

Then there are the seemingly inexplicable moves by the government when it comes to blocking websites, as just recently Wikipedia and BBC in English were released to the online world, while at the same time Blogspot.com sites, which include a lot of blogs, are blocked again.

Perhaps the government feels blogs aren’t useful enough to the masses to cause mass protests when shut down. China Law Blog believes Wikipedia’s broad utility ultimately is what got it back online - and is why it will stay online indefinitely, according to that blog’s estimation.

But the latest ironic twist in China business news was the discovery that the flags representing independence for that pesky far-flung western province are produced in a factory near Guangdong. Read More →

Every now and then I get a jolt of a reminder on how incredibly eager and motivated Chinese people are to get their piece of prosperity pie.

The latest reminder happened this weekend as a friend and I were wandering through People’s Park in downtown Shanghai enjoying the beautiful spring weather. After wandering through a large gathering of elderly people advertising their busy, college-aged children for marriage through simple signs with stats and through chit chat (no joke), we sat down at a bench to marvel at the spectacle.

Little did we know, we had voluntarily subjected ourselves to the long-running “English Corner” that has been happening on Sundays there for the last 30 years. The thirst to improve their English and step up a few rungs on the career ladder became evident as a group of students and a few seniors quickly crushed in around us.

Real life foreigners were talking, and Chinese hung on every word with an intensity I can’t quite fathom happening anywhere in the Western world.

This intensity also applies to Chinese company interaction with foreign companies. Except on the business level, there’s a lot more at stake for foreigners than a wasted afternoon in the park.

A recent column in the Far Eastern Economic Review shed some light on how some pressuring, penny-pinching American companies have fueled some of this parasitic intensity, turning their branded products into the equivalent of wood at a termite feast. Read More →

This morning, I’m sitting at work, scantily clad (it’s early and it’s a home office).

Needless to say, I don’t have any shoes on either.

Which got me to thinking.

What if there’s an earthquake. I’m woefully unprepared for mayhem.

According to eHow.com, here’s how to be better prepared:

• Prepare ahead of time. Make sure your “earthquake preparedness kit” is ready. It probably would be better if it weren’t made in China, but then again, you can’t be picky here. Here are some kit-packing tips.
• Prepare mentally. “Many times, injuries or death occur which could have been prevented due to panic,” eHow says. Experts are mixed over whether you should scream. Screaming could get you some help, but it also could be construed as panic.
• If you are inside when an earthquake begins, stand in a doorway or get under a sturdy desk or table. “Stay a safe distance from any windows, glass doors or large pieces of furniture containing doors or which are not secured to a wall,” eHow says. “If you are outside during the earthquake, get away from buildings, trees, telephone poles and power lines.” Also, getting away from air could help, since other things could fall through it on top of you. If you manage to do that, have an oxygen mask ready.

Read More →

It’s the omnipresent question: What are you doing in China?

Just typing it makes me drool.

But it’s never going away.

Go ahead. Try to avoid it. The next time you’re at a cocktail party in Beijing or Shanghai, or anywhere in between, comment on someone’s great looking tie. Talk about the weather. Buy someone a drink.

But if you get past nihao and a few extra words with anyone – be they laowai or Chinese – you’re going to get asked.

What are you doing in China?

Here’s a short guide to the Top Ten Things You Could Say When Asked, What Are You Doing in China? Each number is followed by our briefing on who will laugh.

Number 10: “I make murders look like suicides. And I make suicides disappear. You could check out my work in China Daily.” [Westerner: Yes/ Chinese: No]

Number 9: “I’m a tank-driving consultant. My office is right next to Tiananmen Square.” [Westerner: Yes/ Chinese: No] Read More →

Some things in the wide world of Chinese copyright infringement present a bit of a challenge in deciphering what is truly the real deal. Is the “Passta” VW a friend spotted recently in Beijing really a knock-off Passat, or just the product of lazy workmanship at the factory? Is the “Disney Cuties” store in the People’s Square Mall of Shanghai authorized, or just another rip-off?

In the online world, however, some things are just easier to compare for legitimacy’s sake. The ‘Facebook of China,’ for instance, makes no effort at concealing its similarities. A quick look at Xiaonei.com (literally: in school), and one gets the feeling the site is the product of a sneaky kid in the back of the class cheating off Facebook’s answer sheet.

So when Xiaonei recently raised somewhere between US$96 and US$435 million, much ado was made about the future of the company, the rise of social networking in China and concomitant business opportunities.

According to Allfacebook.com, a popular, albeit unofficial blog about Facebook, a Chinese version of the genuine site will be released soon, which I thought may spell doom for Xiaonei and its deep-pocket investors.

When the Spanish version of Facebook was released a few months ago, I quickly stopped receiving pesky invitations from the Hi5.com social network popular with my former Chilean classmates.

Instead, I watched as one-by-one every person I knew there quickly became hooked on the features of Facebook and ‘friended’ every person they had ever met, including many foreigners.

I assumed the same would hold true for Xiaonei once Chinese Facebook users were given a tool in their own language, but a Chinese friend, Jessie Lu, I contacted (via Facebook chat) spelled quite a different story. Read More →

“E-Business in China.”

That’s the title of a SwissCham Beijing event last week, but what speakers really talked about was – gasp – how foreigners can make new media in China.

Whoa, back up. Isn’t media – even online – one of those untouchable industries in China?

Yes, it is restricted.

But wait to judge the industry’s prospects until you hear Stephane J. Grand, president of Beijing-based S. J. Grand Financial and Tax Advisory, talk about the loopholes through which foreigners can jump to operate in online media here.

Clearly foreign media people aren’t a bunch of communist sympathizers or yahoos in the wrong industry. They do make Enron’s offshore accounting scheme look basic.

Let’s make this clear: Mr. Grand has a legal background and prescribes a foreign new media regimen that has solid legal footing.

Here are some of his pearls of wisdom:

• The joint venture route to new media is a red herring. “In theory, according to Chinese law, a company with 50 percent foreign investment at the most could apply for [an Internet Content Provider license – critical for operating a website in China to do business],” Mr. Grand said. “In practice, it is extremely difficult for a joint venture to obtain an ICP license.” It would take about a year to get such a license. And the company also would own the domain name – which could NEVER be purchased, sold or transferred. So much for that IPO.
• Use a domestic company with no foreign investment. This company would own the domain name and get the ICP license. However, you would also form a wholly owned foreign enterprise (WFOE), which would generate the content, provide management services to the domestic company, and receive payments from the domestic company. Importantly, the domestic company would not own the trademarks and intellectual property.
• You have a holding company to “capture the value of the venture in a more hospitable environment,” like in Hong Kong. This is what Sina.com does. The holding company is what establishes the aforementioned WFOE. The money also would flow back into the holding company via dividends paid by the WFOE.

Mr. Grand’s advice in more detail can be found in this week’s Powwow podcast.