The changing centre of gravity
Credit: William Olivieri / Unsplash

The changing centre of gravity

Each week, I send out a mail to members of my Exponential View community in the form of a chartbook. Using graphics we explore an important global issue.

This week, I looked at the changing centre of gravity in global trade, the Eastern shift towards China. Three key things struck me, as illustrated in the first charts:

  1. Merchandise trade (products) dominance has shifted to China from the US in just 20 years
  2. TikTok proves that China can, at last, export cultural products and services. TikTok is the first non-American internet content service with more than a billion users, and the second, after Facebook, to have three billion downloads.
  3. In fashion, Shein has demonstrated Chinese founders’ ability to tackle the fast fashion market.

The fourth chart is a shocker, just showing another take on Chinese-American decoupling: the falling patterns of air traffic.

The traditional narrative has been the Asian manufacturing nations could do the production but not the creation of cultural or style products. That seems to be less the case now. What might the ramifications be?

The shifting winds of global trade

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In just 20 years, China’s global trade dominance has crystalised. Is this the shape of the new order??Via The Economist

Cultural exports

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While China might be dominating global trade flows, the country has traditionally struggled to export culture and technology in the way the US has. This is changing. TikTok, for example, recently became the first non-Western app to hit 3 billion downloads globally.?Via SensorTower

But where do you buy your clothes?

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What’s even more telling is the global rise of Shein, the Chinese fast-fashion retailer. It is now the dominant force in US fast-fashion ahead of the likes of Zara and H&M. Remarkable.?Via Earnest Research

The long arm of Covid

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Passenger flights between the US and China have taken a major hit due to Covid-19. It’s unclear if this vital travel corridor will bounce back anytime soon despite how critical it is to both countries.?Via Bloomberg.

I explore issues like these weekly in Exponential View, please do sign up there for more.

William OLIVIERI

AI-FIRST MINDSET ?? Sr Solution Sales Executive @ ServiceNow | Low-Code, Generative AI, Automation | Transforming Ideas into Apps

2 年

Thanks for using my pic as a cover ;)

回复
Umer Khan

Leadership, Growth and Technical Development

3 年

I loved the infographics, brilliant analysis

回复
Farzana Tabbasum

CEO & Founder @ FastTechLink| LinkedIn Growth Expert | Business Strategist| Grant Consultant | MPhil Scholar| Digital Preneur| Digital Marketing Expert | Business Development | Market Research | Data Analyst |

3 年

Yes! we can call it "new world's economic order". China is on the track to economic boom on account of its centrally controlled economic policies.

Nancy Brisson

Author at Substack Newsletter

3 年

These charts are very revealing. The isolationism of the past administration and then the pandemic might explain the expansion of Chinese influence we see in these charts. China, who may have been the source of the pandemic, recovered first from COVID and got right back to work. But we must remember that China is a dictatorship and can control where people work and how much they work. Perhaps that makes authoritarianism look appealing. I hope we can stick with a democratic government. Perhaps America has something new to offer the world besides manufacturing. We just don't have our act together yet.

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