China Resources Holdings Company Limited (), or simply China Resources, is a Chinese

state-owned State ownership, also called government ownership and public ownership, is the ownership of an industry, asset, or enterprise by the state or a public body representing a community, as opposed to an individual or private party. Public ownersh ...

conglomerate that owns a variety of businesses in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

and

Mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...

. Some of its subsidiaries use the name in the form of the

acronym An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

CRC.

History

The company started as Liow & Company () in Hong Kong in 1938. Its original purpose was to raise funds and purchase supplies and equipment for the

Eighth Route Army The Eighth Route Army (), officially known as the 18th Group Army of the National Revolutionary Army of the Republic of China, was a group army under the command of the Chinese Communist Party, nominally within the structure of the Chinese ...

and later

People's Liberation Army The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is the principal military force of the People's Republic of China and the armed wing of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The PLA consists of five service branches: the Ground Force, Navy, Air Force, ...

, then engaged in the

Chinese Civil War The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, continuing intermittently since 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949 with a Communist victory on m ...

. It was renamed as China Resources Corporation () in 1948. In 1983, the company was incorporated as China Resources (Holdings) Company Limited ().

Operations

The company's main business focus is the export of mainland Chinese products (including energy) to Hong Kong. Its retail operations are organised under the China Resources Retail group, and include Chinese Arts & Crafts; it also runs a number of supermarkets in Hong Kong, originally under the CRC name, but now rebranded as

Vanguard The vanguard (also called the advance guard) is the leading part of an advancing military formation. It has a number of functions, including seeking out the enemy and securing ground in advance of the main force. History The vanguard derives fr ...

. It also owns Ng Fung Hong, the monopoly meat importer into Hong Kong.

China Resources Cement China Resources Cement Holdings Limited (CRC) (), parented by China Resources, is a leading cement and concrete producer in Southern China. It is the largest NSP clinker and cement producer in Southern China by production capacity and the second l ...

is the largest NSP clinker and cement producer in Southern China by production capacity and the second largest concrete producer in China by sales volume.China Resources Cement Holdings Limited
/ref> It was established in 2003 and incorporated in

Cayman Islands The Cayman Islands () is a self-governing British Overseas Territory—the largest by population in the western Caribbean Sea. The territory comprises the three islands of Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac and Little Cayman, which are located to the ...

Rank

According to ''Fortune Magazine'', China Resources was ranked 70th on the 2022

Fortune Global 500 The ''Fortune'' Global 500, also known as Global 500, is an annual ranking of the top 500 corporations worldwide as measured by revenue. The list is compiled and published annually by ''Fortune'' magazine. Methodology Until 1989, it listed onl ...

list, improved 73 places since 2014.

Investigation

In 2013 the firm and its chairman at the time,

Song Lin "Charley" Song Lin (; born February 3, 1963) is a former Chinese business executive. At the pinnacle of his career, he served as the Board Chairman and Party Committee Secretary of China Resources, a state-owned conglomerate (company), conglomer ...

, who also held high government rank, was reported to be under investigation regarding the purchase of coal mines in

Shanxi Shanxi (; ; formerly romanised as Shansi) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China and is part of the North China region. The capital and largest city of the province is Taiyuan, while its next most populated prefecture-lev ...

province for 9.9 billion RMB that did not produce any coal for several years after the acquisition. There are substantial reserves of coal in the mines, but exploiting them requires substantial investments. Meanwhile, coal from newly opened strip mines in Mongolia had depressed the market. The deal raised questions about the leverage that large, state-owned firms had to borrow money at low interest for projects of dubious profitability and about where the money went and why.

Notes and references

External links