The emergence of China as an economic superpower

One of China's most famous entrepreneurs will be heading back into the pig feed business as China's pork prices soared almost 60% year-on-year. Liu Yonghao, owner of the New Hope Group, will ramp up production of his agricultural products in the coming future, especially that of pig feed, because he senses a fundamental cause behind the recent price hike.

As he explains, because individual farmers are leaving the business of rasing pigs too abruptly, and large producers have not yet entered to fill the vacuum, supply cannot meet demand. New Hope Group, a conglomerate that manufactures an array of goods ranging from high-tech machinery to agricultural chemicals, will seek to increase supply in this area of no man's land. New Hope Group is the main supplier of pork for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Speaking of the Olympics, while 1.5 million tickets were allocated last year for the games in August, only 450,000 tickets were successfully sold in a recent second round of allocation. That leaves 75% of all second round tickets, about 1.8 million, unsold. Apparently, more than 700,000 orders were put in for the drawings, but less than 150,000 were initially allocated. Why? Simply because many of the tickets demanded centered on a few events and none were demanded on the rest. Talk about inefficient allocation of resources in China these days.

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