Interior China seen as hot growth spot.

• Author: Marshall, Jeffrey
• Position: New markets - Conference news - Brief article

If China is a land of vast opportunity--as well as considerable risk, of course--interior China is a region where opportunity is magnified still more.

Several speakers at a recent Marsh & McLennan panel on "western" China painted a picture of a largely rural area with tremendous potential for tourism and natural resources industries, but one with relatively scant attention until recently because of infrastructure problems and poor connection with the fast-growing port cities to the east like Shanghai and Guangzhou.

Frank Hawke, chairman of Greater China and Southeast Asia for Kroll, a Marsh subsidiary, said there is still extensive poverty in the region around Chengdu, but "islands of development" where real wealth is being created. Much of the discussion focused on the region around Chengdu, about 1,000 miles west of Shanghai.

Hawke and other speakers said the area remains dominated by state-owned industries, but that Western companies are moving in. While only 3.2 percent of foreign direct investment in China went into the region last year, 78 blue-chip global companies have arrived...