Every year I try not to miss the AGM of the Bencham, the Benelux Chamber of Commerce, Beijing. Once again the meeting was held in the offices of the Embassy of the Gran-Duchy of Luxembourg, Pacific Century Plaza on Gongti Bei Lu. For those who don’t know, Benelux stands for the 3 countries Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg. We formed one single chamber as Belgium and Luxembourg would have too few members on their own.

Always a good opportunity to meet old and new friends and … to have a nice Belgian beer!
See also some pics from one of the many events: Fairmont Hotel, 14 March 2013, announcing the results of the Sino Belgian Business Survey 2013. Pictured are, among others, Rik Van Droogenbroeck (Minister Counsellor) and Hubert Cooleman (FIT), both of the Belgian Embassy.

EUCCC stands for the European Chamber of Commerce in China. I use “Ambabel” as my abbreviation for the Belgian Embassy in Beijing.
On 24 April we had the Annual General Meeting of the EUCCC where we had, again, a real election competition: 4 candidates for 3 positions of vice president.
As usual the meeting was opened by our host, the EU Ambassador Markus Ederer (see pic).
Just recently I was also reelected as Chair of the Public Procurement Working Group in the EUCCC.
The EUCCC now has 1700 members in China, with 483 in Beijing and 590 in Shanghai. According to the EU, the EU is still the number one trading partner of China.
I had to leave early as I had another reception in the Belgian Embassy, hosted by our Ambassador Patrick Nijs. Also a good opportunity to enjoy the buffet from our friend and Belgian chef Renaat Morel.

The occasion was the visit of two politicians: Charles Michel (Président, Mouvement Reformateur) and Gilles Mahieu (Secrétaire Général, Parti Socialiste). Luckily for me, they explained a bit about respective roles as I am pretty lost in today’s Belgian politics.
It was a good opportunity to see again other Belgians as it was quite some time I was in an embassy party.

Today I had my first lecture at Beijing Jiaotong University, from 9 am to well after 11:00. The theme was PPP (Public Private Partnership), taking as an example the Bird’s Nest in Beijing (“National Stadium”). It forced me to retrace some of the colorful stories and details about my work for the project. One could call it, the “untold story of the Bird’s Nest”. Indeed, many things happened on the way and today I mentioned some new facts.

In the afternoon, another delegation from the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen (AOG School of management), a group of Dutch managers from the MBA program, led by Philip Wagner of the Wagner Group.
Location: Duge Boutique Hotel, Qianyuan’ensi Hutong, near Nanluoguxiang. A hidden old Chinese gem and friendly staff.
The near 2 hour seminar was the usual (and rather unique) introduction to what is China today, the tremendous changes over the past 30 years, doing business in China, its present challenges, plus my book “Toxic Capitalism” and yes, a look back at the 2008 Olympics (as always requested by our Dutch friends).
Enough talking for today…

See the SCMP editorial, 18 April, 2013:
http://www.scmp.com/comment/insight-opinion/article/1216987/china-needs-break-barriers-innovation?
The article mentions:  “Not a single Chinese firm made it onto the respected consultancy Interbrand’s last list of the world’s top 100 brands.” and looks at some of the causes.
I can’t agree more, I also state the same in my seminars and public talks. I was several times asked to talk in public events on “famous Chinese brands” and pointed out the weaknesses of Chinese brands (even if they actually are pretty good). Other weak points are poor design of their websites, the unwillingness to hire or pay overseas consulting and other services and the rigid Chinese-way operating styles. As I tell our Chinese counterparts: in the eighties you said we had to “adapt to Chinese way” when doing business in China. Now Chinese should do the same in other countries. I also openly criticized the poor PR of Chinese sponsors during the 2008 Olympics: so many chances missed. But you can as well talk to a brick wall.

On 17 April we had a key meeting in the European Chamber (EUCCC) where I was (again) confirmed as chair of the Public Procurement Working Group, a position that I held since I set up the WG in 2005.
The WG is a horizontal one that looks at all public bidding in China, covered by the China Bidding and Tendering Law and the Government Procurement Law, as well as market access generally speaking. According to our estimates it represents a market of around 1 trillion euro per year. Projects covered are power plants, power transmission and distribution, rail and urban transport, water works, etc. Most EU companies have little interest for Government Procurement (I call it “buying stationeries and copy machines for the ministries and the paint for their walls…).

Gilbert with Ms. Yang Dan

We had also a very interesting presentation by Ms. Yang Dan, Deputy Country Director in Beijing for the ADB. She has been deeply involved in public procurement since many years and is probably the most informed specialist I have met in China… She gave us some new insight in possible developments in PPP in China, one of the areas I was deeply involved in during the 2008 Olympics (Public Private Partnerships).