in the most remote place on the planet
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Should the information area of this page be updated to list the new Directors?
Sly, I am not a regular contributor, but I concur with MaterialMind's post 23215. We need to promote SIAF, not bash it in such a reckless way.
Calling Solomon a savage is counterproductive at best. It also indicates the lack of maturity of the poster. Unfortunately, this causes some to disregard other (insightful) posts by RD.
Since my return from the investor trip, I have promoted the stock, nearly evangelizing (with risk disclaimers) about the long term prospects to friends, family, and others. I know that over 100,000 shares have been acquired on my recommendation, and many more would have been acquired if the investors hadn't seen so many of RD's vulgar rants.
It doesn't help SIAF's cheerleaders, whose work could affect the share price positively.
I do understand why you thought that
Yeah, the Brits have dubbed the Hollywood-dressed, bejewelled, and heavily made up women who date or marry their football stars "WAGS" (wives and girlfriends, I thought)
I pointed out that mistake when I visited. I think that future signage and printed material will be corrected.
I think that delays are probably caused by lawyers and others in the review process.
Hi sly, Although often lucky, I'm not the user you meant to reply to.
I think you need to contact the iHub admin.
Solomon is a visionary -- a man with a mission. His combination of skills, experience, knowledge, contacts, strategic thinking, cross-cultural fluency, and business instincts may be irreplaceable.
On the day before the tour began, Solomon presented an overview of status and strategy to a smaller group that arrived early. My first question afterwards was to ask if he has a sizeable life insurance policy to benefit the company and shareholders should anything happen to him.
After the tour, I feel confident that he is a remarkable executive who is capable of carrying out his strategy. We may not like all of his methods, but I think we will like his results.
BTW, Solomon believes that he has the right managers throughout the operating companies and JVs -- all committed to the overall vision -- so that SIAF will prosper without him.
Thanks, Viking, I will check it out
Yes, indeed, that is what he said.
I don't wish to stir up a discussion, or be a nay-sayer, Viking and Sly. For what it's worth, I remember when Solomon said 50 million, and one of us asked if that was the greater metro area, and he said yes. It didn't make sense to me, and I repeated "fifty million?" -- to which he said yes. I think he may have been a) tired and was saying -- or it sounded like -- "fifty" instead of "fifteen" because English is a second language, or b) thinking about and responding to discussion about Leone's market size, which might well be 50 million people. I then asked Anthony for clarification about the population of the Guangzhou greater metropolitan area and he told me 15-18 million.
From Guangzhou, we drove for 3 or 4 hours to reach Zhongshan, then another few hours to Jiangmen and Enping, then a few more back to Guangzhou, and traversed a lot of agricultural and aquaculture land en route. Those cities are closer to Hong Kong and Macau than they are to Guangzhou.
Here's the most recent population breakdown I found for Guangdong province:
http://www.citypopulation.de/China-Guangdong.html
And here's a page I wish I had read before my trip (although I did learn most of the info from other sources). It shows the districts that comprise Guangzhou and lists two other independent cities that are now considered part of the metro area. Their total population doesn't approach half of the total population of Guangdong province.
http://wikitravel.org/en/Guangzhou
In Xining, we were told that there are plans to add 50 more "Cattle Society Beefsteak Restaurants," and to franchise another 100. Of course, these are aspirations, Ecuador.
The Leonie restaurant chain will be expanded In Guangdong province, and in Malaysia.
BTW, although I heard Solomon say that Guangzhou's population is 50 million, it seemed too high and I think he probably meant (or said) 15 million.
When I look at the article, sly, I see it was posted September 5. We visited on the 7th. But I took photos that are very similar to these, of the area's aquaculture, including adjacent open ponds. The "local farmers" on the red L-shaped sofa (in the fishfirst.cn article) are in the room where we ate prawns. In my photo of that room, Jonathan and a local SIAF guy are sitting on that sofa to prepare or serve tea, and you are standing opposite, watching them, while most of the group sat at tables. My guess is that the open ponds below that photo on the web page belong to the local farmers pictured. But I could be completely wrong.
I was struck by the many large rivers we crossed en route to PF2. It was located in a delta type region that was mostly populated with traditional prawn (and perhaps fish) farms. The rare spots that weren't used for aquaculture were either marshland or engineered canals (along which roads were built). PF2 stood out as a high tech, entirely non-traditional operation.
Solomon pointed out the boundaries of PF2 when we asked about the open aquaculture adjacent to the operations we had just toured, and said they were not part is SIAF's business. He did not allude to the other ponds being affiliated with SIAF's business interests. I photographed the adjacent open ponds after we entered the PF2 "compound" and before I was informed of the boundaries. I suspect the local media did also, and didn't hear Solomon's discussions with us, as they were separate from us and may not have spoken English.
I am fairly certain that the large open ponds in the Chinese article with photos were visible at PF2, adjacent to and surrounding the PF2 property, but belonged to another prawn farm. Perhaps Chad can verify that.
Thank you; they seem rather ordinary to me. Most of my photos include people on the tour, and those are off limits. I will take some time to look for anything that may be interesting and that's also "impersonal" and post it. Then I will re-reply to this and let you know.
I agree with you, stolpen, and enjoyed reading the later article about China that jcanuck posted (19927 and 19928).
Everywhere we went in China, the landscape was crisscrossed with high tension wires. Everywhere. You will notice it in the photos (at PF2) I linked to in a recent post. China's energy demands are huge, and "green" approaches are critical.
For a simple reason, stolpen: we have had a large investment in SIAF over the past few years. Crazy stock performance over the past year made me want to investigate the company first hand, in addition to analytical due diligence.
IIRC, there were four open ponds, with liners and visible filtration equipment. Two were inside the gate, and two others were just outside the buildings containing the indoor tanks. The latter two ponds mirrored one another - symmetrical with walkways all around and through the middle. I posted a couple of photos (plus the entry gate) here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/88032963@N07/sets/72157631689278144/
I'm not certain why the pond liners are used. The surrounding area clearly has a high water table (unpaved ponds or canals everywhere around), yet PF2's ponds are already constructed of concrete, so why another barrier or liner? How would it prevent contamination? Someone more technical than I may have the answer.
Interesting op-ed piece about China. An expert is quoted saying, "'Green' doesn't sell in China.'"
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/03/opinion/friedman-china-needs-its-own-dream.html
There was a beautiful and bright Swedish woman on the tour, stolpen, but I am American.
Viking, the pond in photo 3 was one of the ponds that Solomon told me was used to supply salt water to the tanks.
Since I am new on the board, I'm limited to 3 posts/day, so I hope slyestjester reads this. Hi John, I'm Carol. I'm sure that you know more than I about what's happening.
For what it's worth to any reader, I embarked on the tour with a very high degree of skepticism, and remained alert for any perceived deception through all of our visits. The outcome is that I am convinced SIAF is a winner, and I've bought more stock since returning home.
Yes, I was on the tour and I refer to the existing outdoor (open) ponds at PF2. Perhaps the Phase 2 open dams will be used for aquaculture, but my impression was that prawns will be grown in controlled indoor tanks, so that the limited outdoor growing season will not constrain the ability to achieve maximum production.
At PF2 there were also precautions (procedures) to prevent introducing contaminants, diseases or other problems (disinfecting our footwear, quarantine areas, etc.). It would be far more difficult to control these factors using open ponds.
Perhaps another member of the tour group can clarify.
Swede, I asked Solomon if the outdoor ponds would be used for aquaculture, and he told me what I said in my prior message.
Very nice chart. My comments:
- I'm not sure PF2 has outdoor prawn farming. There are salt water ponds outdoors which, when filtered, refresh the water in the indoor tanks. Plans are to cover the outdoor ponds to better control water quality and reduce evaporation.
- SJAP operates one restaurant now, with (overly?) ambitious expansion goals (up to 50 restaurants, plus franchising another 100).
- Leonies Restaurants are already in Malaysia, and Solomon is working with them to open a total of 50 in China by end of 2013
Check out Chinese government stats and the World Health Organization report (2011). Both report Xining's poor air quality which, like most urban areas surrounded by mountains, worsens and improves with weather conditions and by season.
Xining itself is a city of skyscrapers and growth in all directions with a population of over 2.2 million people. Its air is more polluted than Beijing's. that said, Xining is surrounded by beautiful Himalayan peaks, and is a preferred holiday location for the Chinese.