Factories Start Reopening as Coronavirus Slow

China’s factories start reopening as new cases of Coronavirus slow to a crawl.

Back to Work

For the recent months, people have been prohibited from working. Most employees were sent home. As many as 300 million workers were not able to work. Big businesses and factories had to close down for almost three weeks. 

These were done in order to prevent further spreading of the Coronavirus. However, it also put a significant strain on the economy of China. China holds a central place in many of the world’s businesses. They play a significant role in the global supply chain. 

The Coronavirus was becoming serious. President Xi Jinping put an exclamation mark on China’s priorities by “waging war” on Coronavirus. He said this in a speech he delivered last month. 

In that same speech though, President Xi Jinping also stressed the importance of reaching economic goals and social developments. Most people thought that both messages were hard to reconcile. However, this month proved otherwise.

The number of new Coronavirus cases has slowed down. This has allowed many people in China to get back to work. 

A number of measures are currently in effect. These measures will work to ensure that people stay healthy and get to work too.

These measures include chartering buses for workers and buying out whole hotels for their quarantined staff members. For factories that do not have enough workers, shuttered movie studios are lending out their manpower to fill the gap. 

Some factories and businesses actually started opening a week ago. At the same time, they also weakened the emergency levels in several regions. This meant that people could now leave their houses without fear of being reprimanded.

The biggest problem though is still the lack of manpower that will help China reach their economic goals.

Business Woes

All businesses still have problems to face despite the reopening of factories and companies. Numerous surveys show and confirm these various problems. 

One survey was conducted by the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business in Beijing. Last February, they found out that almost 50% of businesses couldn’t resume their operations. The businesses said that the biggest factor was the dwindling labor force. 

A meek 11% were confident that they would be able to reach high to full production capacity by the end of February. 

Surveys were also given to European and German chambers of commerce. They indicated that almost 60% of their members in China said that the Coronavirus outbreak had a significant impact on their business. 

They also said that they will be lowering their expectations by about 10% in the first quarter of 2020. 

The American Chamber of Commerce in China also carried out a survey. It said that firms in America were also affected. Due to the outbreak, companies in America are facing increased costs and lower revenues. It was mainly the restrictions in certain operations and travelling.

The main thing is that companies in China are in a race against time. They must jumpstart their operations in order to retake their place within the world’s supply chain.


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Tags:china, China Factories, Coronavirus

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