Word: weather
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...more than half a million travelers who were stuck outside the station in the closing days of January after some of the most severe weather in decades brought China to a virtual standstill. Unusually frigid weather and heavy snowfall severed crucial transport arteries including major rail lines, highways and airports; power outages rolled across 17 provinces, forcing factories and businesses to close. The southern part of the country, which hadn't seen snow like this since 1954, was woefully unprepared. Even more northerly cities such as Shanghai, which is near the coast, were staggered by winter's wallop. At least...
...weird weather hit at a particularly bad time. Every year, in what is often called the world's largest annual migration, an estimated 180 million mainlanders go on holiday or travel home to be with their families to celebrate the Spring Festival, also known as Chinese New Year. Millions of these travelers are migrant workers - the real dynamo driving China's economic boom - who leave behind their jobs in factories and construction sites across the country for one of the few vacations many are allowed to take. But this year is different. Bad weather is making travel impossible; millions have...
...delayed by seven or eight hours," says an executive at the company surnamed Feng. The company also owns more than 200 trucks but the snow "affects our highway transportation more than it does railways," Feng says. "We used to ship two 40-foot containers daily, but given the weather conditions, we stopped our truck traffic completely on the 25th." Although it's hard to give an exact number for the losses the company faces, they "will no doubt be substantial," Feng sighs...
...possibility of reduced growth if the U.S. slumps into a recession. In China, "risks to growth also inevitably mean risks to [social] stability," says Patrick Horgan, China managing director for Washington, D.C.-based consultants APCO Worldwide. "On a big scale like this, it's no longer just about the weather but about the ability of the government to govern." And if you had to pick one area of the economy that scares the authorities in China the most it would have to be inflation, which hits citizens where it hurts most - in the wallet. The country's consumer price index...
...While Guangzhou avoided the worst of the weather, it is the site of some of the most vivid scenes of adversity. The city, capital of the country's most prosperous province, is a major transit hub through which millions of migrants would have to pass on their homeward journey. Road and rail outages have left as many as half a million stranded here. The main rail link between Guangzhou and Beijing was disabled when heavy snow and ice in Hunan province knocked out power lines last weekend, leaving at least 136 trains stranded, according to Xinhua. Several highways north...