The New Silk Road

Sometimes one wonders where the new Silk Road starts and ends. Does the global commerce caravan travel through China as an agent for cost-effective production, or, is China the principal player to whose tunes the world unwittingly dances?

How did China feature in the US Senate TODAY?

If you care about this dialog, deepen the discussion THIS SATURDAY ... come listen to Tarun Khanna, the Jorge Paulo Lemann Professor at Harvard Business School deliver the lunch keynote on Saturday June 16th. Here is your chance to figure it out in his keynote titled "Billions of entrepreneurs: How China and India are Reshaping their Futures and Yours"

The once 'far away Communist country' has now emerged as an economic powerhouse with vast influence in commodity, capital and currency markets (amongst others). It is a country that sees big green while retaining its deep red core.

With huge trade surpluses and an appetite for foreign investments in discrete sectors, China seems to have found a way to successfully retain its communist core while nurturing various layers of creative and compelling capitalism around it. With a slow, almost studied approach to transforming its economy, it has deeply integrated itself into the global marketplace without breaking down like the Eastern European countries and former USSR. All along, it has also managed to empower its vast human resources to become hyper-efficient agents of commerce without the promise of a commensurate reward system that capitalism offers.

Are you ready to be part of the new bandwagon of economic growth that winds its way through this ancient land in warp-speed? Do you think the 2008 Beijing Olympics will mark a milestone for global attention and further growth?

Or, do you feel that this growth will be tempered by recent U.S. moves to influence the Chinese to revalue their currency? Some estimate that the Chinese Yuan is 40% devalued allowing it to flood other countries' markets with super-cheap products, hence enjoying an unfair trade advantage.

Allright, enough of this e-dialog... show up at TiECON East, meet a few leading thinkers and practitioners and engage in a healthy mind-meld on where the Chinese economy is headed. Be part of the action. Or, become a part of forgotten history because you did not visit http://www.tieconeast.org/ and jump on the caravan!

sai at obviousideas dot com