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The Huangpu River splits the Chinese city of Shanghai between the older settlement on the west and the newer, financial center on the east.
Johannes Eisele | Afp | Getty Images
China’s latest wave of Covid restrictions has forced millions of people — roughly three times as many as live in New York City — to stay home and undergo mass virus testing in the metropolis of Shanghai.
As Covid cases began to spike in late February, Shanghai tried to control the outbreak with targeted, neighborhood lockdowns. But the city, a center for global transport, manufacturing, finance and trade, decided in late March to implement a two-stage lockdown that soon applied to all districts, generally forcing people not to leave their apartments.
Most people outside China know that Shanghai is big, but few realize just how big economically. The following numbers indicate the scale of Shanghai as an economic center — and may hint at the cost of the lockdown.
Size
GDP
Global trade center
Shanghai sits at the mouth of the Yangtze River, one of the two main rivers in China.
According to Bernstein:
- Shanghai is home to the world’s busiest port, followed by Singapore.
- Shanghai’s Pudong airport is the world’s third-busiest cargo airport, behind Memphis, Tennessee, and Hong Kong.
In all, Shanghai accounted for 7.3% of China’s exports and 14.4% of imports in 2021, according to Citi.
Manufacturing and corporate center
According to Citi, Shanghai is China’s:
- Most important semiconductor manufacturing center, home to SMIC, Hua Hong and Universal Scientific Industrial.
- Home to many auto producers: SAIC Motor, SAIC’s joint companies with Volkswagen and GM, Nio, Tesla and Ford.
- Headquarters or a major center for multinational corporations’ China operations: Apple, L’Oreal, Samsung Electronics, P&G, L’Oreal, LVMH, Nike, Panasonic, Philips, Johnson & Johnson and General Electric, among others.
- Base for ship producers: Jiangnan , Zhonghua and Waigaoqiao shipbuilding.
Finance
Consumer hub
In Shanghai, official figures for 2021 show:
- Average disposable income of 78,027 yuan ($12,288) — more than double the nationwide average of 35,128 yuan ($5,531).
- Average consumer spending of 48,879 yuan — also double the national average of 24,100 yuan.
U.S. wholesale chain Costco chose Shanghai for its first mainland China store in 2019.
And as of last year, Shanghai was home to the most coffee shops in the country, with nearly 3 shops per 10,000 people, versus a ratio of about 2 for Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Beijing, according to Meituan.
Shanghai is home to three of the top 20 universities in China, according to U.S. News and World Report.
The number of foreigners living in Shanghai fell to 163,954 people in 2020, down by 21% versus a decade earlier, according to official censuses. The southern province of Guangdong is now home to the most foreigners in China, at more than 400,000.
The overall number of foreigners in the country rose during those 10 years by about 40% to 1.4 million people — or about 0.1% of China’s population.
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