By Nicolas Parasie
The Wall Street Journal - May 25, 2014
As the world’s second-largest consumer of oil, China in the past
decade has relied heavily on the Middle East to secure the resources
required to fuel its ascendancy to become an economic superpower. In
doing so, it overtook the U.S. as principal investor in the Middle East
and played a pivotal role in transforming the region by lifting its
economic and living standards.
Those strong economic ties are now broadening beyond China’s demand
for commodities and will further shape the Middle East – and Africa –
for at least another generation to come, according to an HSBCHSBA.LN +1.23% report on the impact of China’s economic globalization on the region.
“There would be no kilometer tall towers in the desert, no ski slopes
in the shopping mall, no Gulf owned football teams winning the English
premier league, without the emergence of China as a global economic
power,” said Simon Williams and Razan Nasser from HSBC.
Indeed, the gross domestic product of the Gulf region’s exporters has
risen by $1 trillion to $1.7 trillion in the past decade alone, lifting
per capita GDP to an average of $35,000 and close to $100,000 in Qatar
and Abu Dhabi, according to the report.
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