BEIJING, July 18 -- The big company names hog the headlines of global business, but China is a country of small enterprises.
They are known as the SMEs, or small and-medium-sized enterprises.
Used to riding on the economic growth of the past few decades, these SMEs are now faced with a host of new challenges.
There are nearly 300,000 SMEs in China, providing more than 56 million jobs compared with the 17 million in large companies, figures from the National Bureau of Statistics have shown.
Since the end of last year, SMEs in China have been hampered by rising material costs and sluggish demand worldwide, as well as by higher labor costs and new government regulations at home. As profit margins wear thin, many are throwing in the towel.
The name of the game has turned to one of waiting - waiting for the next cheap site to relocate businesses, waiting to learn of the next resource-saving technique, and perhaps, more importantly, waiting for any sort of guidance from Beijing for the road ahead.
(Source: China Daily)
