BEIJING – Anti-virus controls, which have closed some of China’s largest cities and caused public outrage, are spreading with rising infections, hurting a weak economy and warning of possible global shockwaves.
Shanghai is easing rules that restricted most of its 25 million people in their homes after complaining of food problems. But most of his businesses are still closed. Access to Guangzhou, an industrial center with 19 million people near Hong Kong, was cut off this week. Other cities cut off access or closed factories and schools.
Spring planting by Chinese farmers, who feed 1.4 billion people, could be interrupted, Nomura economists warned on Thursday. This could increase demand for imported wheat and other foods, raising already high world prices.
The closure is a disruption to the ruling Communist Party and an obstacle to official efforts to sustain declining growth in the world’s second-largest economy. They come in a delicate year when President Xi Jinping is expected to try to break with tradition and win a third five-year term as leader.
Beijing has promised to cut human and economic costs for its zero-COVID strategy, but on Wednesday ruled out joining the United States and other governments that are lifting restrictions and trying to live with the virus.
“The work on prevention and control cannot be facilitated,” Xi said, according to the official Xinhua news agency. “Perseverance is victory.”
China’s risk of falling into recession is rising, warn Ting Lu, Jing Wang and Nomura’s Harrison Zhang in a report.
“The logistics crisis is getting worse,” they said. “Markets must also be concerned about the delayed spring planting of grain in China.
The government reported 29,411 new cases on Thursday, all but 3,020 without symptoms. Shanghai represents 95% of this total, or 27,719 cases. All but 2,573 had no symptoms.
A health official warned on Wednesday that Shanghai was not keeping the virus under control despite easing restrictions.
About 6.6 million people were allowed to leave their homes in areas where there were no new cases for at least a week. But at least 15 million others are still barred from the outdoors.
Most people have obeyed, despite grumbling about the lack of food, medicine and access to elderly relatives in need. But videos on the popular social media service Sina Weibo show some trade strikes with police.
Grape Chen, a data analyst in Shanghai, said he was panicking about taking medication for his father, who is recovering from a stroke. She called police after receiving no response from an official hotline, but was told quarantine rules forbade staff from helping.
“We are ready to cooperate with the country,” Chen said. “But we also hope that our lives can be respected.”
Suzhou City, a smartphone manufacturing center and other high-tech industry west of Shanghai, has told its 18 million people to stay home whenever possible.
Taiyuan, a city of 4 million people in central China, has stopped intercity bus services, according to China’s official information service. Ningde in the southeast forbade residents to leave.
A chef at a Taiyuan restaurant said his family had been locked up in their apartment complex since April 3rd after cases were found in neighboring complexes.
“Our lives will be severely affected if the restrictions continue for a long time,” said the chef, who would only name Chen.
“My wife and I don’t earn anything,” Chen said. “We have three dependent children.”
All but 13 of China’s 100 largest cities in terms of economic output are under some form of restriction, according to Gavekal Dragonomics, a research firm.
“The intensity is increasing,” Gavekal said in a report this week.
The volume of cargo handled by Shanghai, the world’s busiest port, has fallen by 40%, according to the European Union’s Chamber of Commerce in China. Car manufacturers have stopped production due to supply disruptions.
Restrictions on areas producing smartphones, consumer electronics and other goods around the world are forecast to reduce expectations for this year’s economic growth to just 5%, a sharp drop from last year’s 8.1% increase.
The ruling party’s target is 5.5%. Growth fell to 4% from a year earlier in the last quarter of 2021, after tighter official debt controls caused a slump in sales of housing and construction, industries that support millions of jobs.
Even before the last stops, the ruling party promised tax refunds and other aid for entrepreneurs who generate wealth and jobs.
Premier Li Keqiang, leader of №2 and a senior economic official, called this week for a “faster spread” of aid to businesses facing a “key moment in survival”, China News Service reported.
Under a strategy called “dynamic clean-up”, the authorities are trying to use more targeted measures to isolate neighborhoods instead of entire cities with populations larger than some countries. But some local leaders are calling for more scrutiny.
Leaders in Shanghai have been criticized for trying to minimize economic damage by ordering tests, but have not stopped since the cases were discovered last month. A stop was ordered across the city with a warning in just a few hours after the number of cases increased.
This was in contrast to Shenzhen, a 17.5 million technology and financial center near Hong Kong that closed the city on March 13 after an epidemic and ordered mass tests. It reopened a week later and business returned to normal.
Guangzhou imitates Shenzhen. Most access to the city of 19 million was cut off on Monday, and mass tests were ordered after 27 infections were discovered.
Li Guanyu, a 31-year-old woman in Guangzhou, said residents could only leave her apartment once a day to buy food, but the shops were well stocked.
“It happened a little suddenly,” Lee said. “Perhaps the situation in Shanghai is so bad that Guangzhou began mass tests and blockades as soon as the cases were discovered.
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AP Yu Bing researchers in Beijing and Chen Xi in Shanghai and video producer Olivia Zhang from Beijing.
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