China has replaced the US as the world's top consumer, eclipsing the world's richest economy in consumption of four of the five basic food, energy and industrial commodities, according to a report from a global environmental think tank.
Growing at a rapid rate, China has taken the lion's share in the consumption of grain, meat, coal and steel, and loses out to the US only in oil among the five basic commodities, according to the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute.
In another key area, fertiliser, China's use is double that of the US, while among television sets, refrigerators and
mobile phones the world's most populous nation is way ahead.
Among leading consumer products, China trails the US only in cars, the institute said in a report.
It will only be a matter of time before China, the world's most populous nation, overtakes the US in the use of personal computers. The number of PCs in China is doubling every 28 months, the report said.
The institute's president Lester Brown said, however, that there was a downside to China's insatiable appetite for raw materials to fuel its unstoppable economy, saying it was driving up not only commodity prices but ocean shipping rates as well.
The Chinese consuming prowess would also deal yet another blow to the US, which suffers a massive trade deficit with the Asian giant and is heavily dependent on Chinese capital to underwrite its debt.
'If China ever decides to divert this capital surplus elsewhere, either to internal investment or to the development of oil, gas, and mineral resources elsewhere in the world, the US economy will be in trouble,' Brown said.
