gross domestic product

Dec. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Indonesia has a scandal on its hands, and it involves gross domestic product.

That won’t sound too serious to observers worried about corruption or anti-pornography laws intensifying debates about Islam’s role in public. Yet what might best be described as the “4 percent crisis” is getting breathless press coverage.

That’s the dismal rate at which many expect the economy will grow next year. What, did someone say dismal? When you look around the world, it’s hard to think of a sizeable economy that might perform at even close to 4 percent.

What is important is not what it is but what it is becoming......

Shanghai's office and hotel towers are ritzy, the entertainment area, Xintiandi, looks like a Chinese version of London's Covent Garden, and Shanghai girls dress with an almost French sophistication. The city has certainly done a better job of controlling Sars and traffic flows than Beijing. No wonder that this year, all the big foreign conference organisers shifted to Shanghai.

Japan's economy may still be four times bigger than China's, but some time ago it passed the baton marked "economic powerhouse" to its large northern neighbour. China's economy is ripping along at 8-10 per cent a year. Japan's is shrinking in nominal terms. China is attracting record foreign direct investment, Japan a relative trickle.

someone wants to pay attention to this!

Armed with a powerful microscope, Sumio Iijima aims to build a new world. He's a leading researcher in nanotechnology, the burgeoning field of creating new materials and devices by using atoms and molecules as building blocks.