AP IMPACT: China surpasses US as top global trader By By JOE McDONALD and YOUKYUNG LEE, AP Business Writers - DEC 2012 SEOUL, South Korea (AP) â Shin Cheol-soo no longer sees his future in the United States. The South Korean businessman supplied components to American automakers for a decade. But this year, he uprooted his family from Detroit and moved home to focus on selling to the new economic superpower: China. Last year, Shin's ENA Industry Co. made half his sales of rubber and plastic parts to U.S. factories. But his plans call for China, which overtook the United States as the biggest auto market in 2009, to rise fivefold to 30 percent of his total by 2015. He and his children are studying Mandarin. "The United States is a tiger with no power," Shin said in his office, where three walls are lined with books, many about China. "Nobody can deny that China is the one now rising." In just five years, China has surpassed the United States as a trading partner for much of the world, including U.S. allies such as South Korea and Australia, according to an Associated Press analysis of trade data. As recently as 2006, the U.S. was the larger trading partner for 127 countries, versus just 70 for China. By last year the two had clearly traded places: 124 countries for China, 76 for the U.S. The findings show how fast China has ascended to challenge America's century-old status as the globe's dominant trader, a change that is gradually translating into political influence. They highlight how pervasive China's impact has been, spreading from neighboring Asia to Africa and now emerging in Latin America, the traditional U.S. backyard. Despite China's now-slowing economy, its share of world output and trade is expected to keep rising, with growth forecast at up to 8 percent a year over the next decade, far above U.S. and European levels. In one sense, China's growing presence in trade is just restoring the Middle Kingdom to its historic dominance. China was the biggest economy for centuries until about 1800, when the Industrial Revolution propelled first Europe and then the U.S. into the lead. On a new 50-kilometer (30-mile) highway leading north of Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, dark asphalt stretches across six to eight lanes. The $300 million road was built by three Chinese companies and financed by the African Development Bank and the Export-Import Bank of China. It has cut a trip that took several hours 18 months ago to 10 minutes, said Joseph Makori, a professional driver. "When we see the people from America, they say, 'We want to assist Kenya'," said Makori as he looked for work at an interchange about 10 kilometers from downtown. "But I don't see it. China comes and I see one thing: the road." http://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2012/12/02/ap-impact-china-overtaking-us-as-global-trader