Scott Rozelle

Natalie Hell

"Twenty years ago, seemingly everything for sale at American retailers had a "Made In China" sticker on it. Now, things have changed. Every year, forty thousand Chinese factories are shuttering their doors as businesses seek cheaper labor elsewhere. Clothes manufacturing is moving to Bangladesh and Vietnam, for example, and shoes to Ethiopia. The exodus is well underway. Even as American commentators fret over "rising China," the real threat lies in a virtually unknown story: that of a nation struggling amid a profound economic transition away from manufacturing. The culprit? Profound inequality and the lack of investment in the people of the most populous place on earth. Health and education are the grave challenges for the country's future-and the world. Far from the prospect of global takeover, a China newly adrift has the potential to be our most unpredictable security challenge in the next decades. This book, a warning from Scott Rozelle and Natalie Hell, cuts through the false alarmism while laying out an ambitious plan to correct course before it's too late"--

How the Urban-Rural Divide Threatens China's Rise

The Invisible China

Jikun Huang

Syed Arif Husain

Aaron Zazueta

This case study is one of six evaluations of the implementation of the World Bank's 1991 Forest Strategy. This and the other cases (Brazil, Cameroon, Costa Rica, India, and Indonesia) complement a review of the entire set of lending and nonlending activities of the World Bank Group and the Global Environment Facility. This OED study finds that while China's forest program was highly successful, much remains to be done. Too little is known, for example, about the distribution of benefits between households and production and marketing units. The implications of the recent logging ban require careful analysis. Policy reforms, particularly for state-owned enterprises, must still be completed. Data on what is happening in China's forests is inadequate to support a firm judgment, particularly regarding the country's natural forests. There is almost a complete absence of systematic knowledge about the nation's current stock and future trends of the supply, demand, marketing, and trade for timber and some key non-timber products. Finally China has graduated from IDA funding to IBRD lending, a prospect believed to have serious consequences for the most innovative aspect of China's program, a "responsibility system," that ensures a high level of ownership for the protection of the country's forests. In addition, recent controversies regarding the treatment of indigenous peoples in Xizang are already increasing risks for the Bank's new style forest sector investments, which have tended to focus on the poorest mountain populations, many of which include ethnic minorities.

From Afforestation to Poverty Alleviation and Natural Forest Management

China

As the glittering skyline in Shanghai seemingly attests, China has quickly transformed itself from a place of stark poverty into a modern, urban, technologically savvy economic powerhouse. But as Scott Rozelle and Natalie Hell show in Invisible China, the truth is much more complicated and might be a serious cause for concern. China’s growth has relied heavily on unskilled labor. Most of the workers who have fueled the country’s rise come from rural villages and have never been to high school. While this national growth strategy has been effective for three decades, the unskilled wage rate is finally rising, inducing companies inside China to automate at an unprecedented rate and triggering an exodus of companies seeking cheaper labor in other countries. Ten years ago, almost every product for sale in an American Walmart was made in China. Today, that is no longer the case. With the changing demand for labor, China seems to have no good back-up plan. For all of its investment in physical infrastructure, for decades China failed to invest enough in its people. Recent progress may come too late. Drawing on extensive surveys on the ground in China, Rozelle and Hell reveal that while China may be the second-largest economy in the world, its labor force has one of the lowest levels of education of any comparable country. Over half of China’s population—as well as a vast majority of its children—are from rural areas. Their low levels of basic education may leave many unable to find work in the formal workplace as China’s economy changes and manufacturing jobs move elsewhere. In Invisible China, Rozelle and Hell speak not only to an urgent humanitarian concern but also a potential economic crisis that could upend economies and foreign relations around the globe. If too many are left structurally unemployable, the implications both inside and outside of China could be serious. Understanding the situation in China today is essential if we are to avoid a potential crisis of international proportions. This book is an urgent and timely call to action that should be read by economists, policymakers, the business community, and general readers alike.

Scott Rozelle

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