Yesterday, we told you about the Soc Gen research note “The China Domino has Fallen!” and its alarming conclusion that the world needs to expect significantly more inflation in the near term. Included in that report is a rather complex, but explanative chart, on just why this is happening. It displays the global supply and demand curve. While there are a great deal of variables at work here, the key, according to Soc Gen’s latest, is the expected surge in Asian consumers from China’s rebalancing…

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It stands to reason that as an economy as substantial as that of China makes its presence increasingly felt in the world economy the other players in the world economy will feel the ramifications of economic activity occurring in China and the surrounding region. To a lesser degree, the same might also be said for economic activity occurring in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as such activity can have ramifications for economic actors in other parts of the world. That stated, it seems unlikely that ASEAN‘s economic impact upon the global economy of the future will be as significant as that of China since China’s economy is more cohesive and streamlined compared to the more loosely arranged economies of ASEAN.

In other news pertaining to China it recently came to this blogger’s attention that the Chinese island of Taiwan may soon be the site of robotic immigration checkpoints at some point in the future. To quote directly from an article written by Loa lok-sin posted on the official website of the Taipei Times, TaipeiTimes.com:

In a few years, visitors could pass through unmanned immigration booths following instructions given by smiling robots when they step off the plane at Taiwan’s international airports, National Immigration Agency (NIA) -Director–General Hsieh Li-kung (謝立功) said yesterday. The first unmanned immigration inspection booths were installed on Tuesday at Shueitou Pier (水頭碼頭) in Kinmen County, from which ferries depart to Xiamen, China. “At this point, automatic immigration inspection booths have been installed only at Shueitou Pier, and are open only to [Republic of China (ROC)] nationals,” Hsieh told the Taipei Times during a telephone interview. “We plan to install the system at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport next month — but only for [ROC] nationals as well.”

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Clearly, the conditions of international travel are likely to change in the future as technological improvements continue to present themselves. However the idea of passing through a robotic immigration and/or customs checkpoint still seems somewhat alien, at least to this blogger. One wonders if such technological innovation will soon change the face of ports of entry to the United States or if robots of the United States Customs and Border Protection Service (USCBP) will one day usher in American Citizens upon their return to the United States of America. Such developments remain to be seen as of the time of this writing.

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