Page 36 - wfjulaug2011

On the question of footwear consumption in China, Mr Li’s answer reflects this special focus. He anticipates that demand will indeed double and has been trying to stock up on raw material for about a year and storing it so that he can take in his stride any sudden rush for leather on the part of his customers. His store of wet blue and crust is “maybe the largest in China”, he says. According to the research he has carried out—which he says is extensive—today, in China’s cities, the average woman buys five pairs of shoes and two pairs of boots each year: three pairs of shoes for spring and summer, plus two and two pairs of boots for winter. In the countryside, things are different, and two pairs per woman per year is the figure for footwear consumption that

Li Chen believes to be accurate. Nevertheless, seven pairs of footwear for each female member of the urban population is a huge figure. For illustrative purposes, the CIA World Factbook’s figures for 2007 suggested the male population of China was slightly larger than the female. It also suggested an urban population across China of 562 million people (42.3% of the total population). If we assume, stressing that this is for illustrative purposes only, that the proportions of men and women are the same among the urban population as in rural communities, we could put the number of Chinese women living in cities at more than 272 million. Li Chen says they are averaging an annual consumption of seven pairs of shoes and boots each, giving a total of 1.9 billion pairs.

The first of four retanning and finishing departments that footwear supplier Xingye Leather Technology is building near Jinjiang City. The company is investing heavily to double its output of shoe upper leather in anticipation of rising demand in the domestic market