Manufacturing

With competitive prices and improved quality, China's steel giant Sinosteel Corporation is exploring the market potential in Turkey's steel industry as an equipment provider and contractor.

The Sinosteel Equipment and Engineering Co., Ltd. (Sinosteel MECC), a subsidiary of Sinosteel, had completed construction of 16 steel-producing or related projects in Turkey in the past decade, with a contracted value of 200 million U.S. dollars, Pan Xiaoyong, Sinosteel MECC representative in Turkey told Xinhua.

The company had another 11 projects under way, with a total investment of 300 million U.S. dollars, said Pan.

Sinosteel MECC provided Turkish steel mills with mining and steel-producing equipment at prices considerably lower than those offered by western companies, which helped the company to win market opportunities, said Pan.

China will launch its second lunar probe, Chang'e-2, in October 2010, a top Chinese space scientist told China Daily on Thursday.

The newspaper quoted Ye Peijian, chief designer of the nation's first moon probe, as saying that the second lunar orbiter will carry different payloads and orbit the moon in a different way.

"It will orbit 100 km closer to the moon and be equipped with better facilities. We expect to acquire more scientific data about the moon with increased accuracy," he was quoted as saying.

A survey published here Wednesday showed that Chinese manufacturers are more optimistic about China's economic development than about the world economy.

About one-third of 2,067 Chinese manufacturers surveyed hold that the country's economy has walked out of "winter" and is already on the track of growth, compared to only 15 percent who said the world economy is back to growth, the survey revealed.

It also found 53 percent of the respondents think the country's economy would maintain the status quo, and yet another 13 percent hold the economy is yet to see worse times.

Survey samples include capital-intensive enterprises in the economically-developed Pearl River Delta and Yangtze River Delta regions as well as those in the central and less-developed western regions of the country. These enterprises are engaged in industries covering telecommunications equipment, electronics, electric and machinery, garment, paper-making and printing.

The gross domestic product (GDP) of China's western regions rose 12.5 percent in the first nine months from a year earlier, China's top economic planner said Thursday.

The growth rate was 4.8 percentage points higher than the national rate, said a statement on the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) website.

China launched the "West Development Strategy" in January 2000 to help underdeveloped western regions catch up with the more prosperous eastern regions.

The western regions comprise 12 provinces, autonomous regions and municipality, which have a combined population of about 370 million and account for 71.4 percent of the country's total land area.