Mr. Muhtar Kent, President and CEO of the Coca-Cola Company, expressed that China is of the top importance in the Company’s global development strategy, for its business in China has enjoyed double-digit growth for 5 years in succession, in an interview with the Xinhua News Agency reporters.  

“Although the world’s economy will drop by 2.9% in 2009, China will exclusively maintain the healthy momentum of growth among the world’s main economies,” he said, “it’s an entirely different world here.”

“Of course, some other countries in Latin America and Asia may also keep economic growth, but China is the only one among world’s main economies,” he added.

He owed this trend to the Chinese government’s economic stimulus package for expanding domestic demand. “China’s economic stimulus plan of 4,000 billion yuan works so well, in not only planning but also implementation.”

In the 1st quarter of 2009, Coca-Cola’s business in China increased by 11%, with its global business growth being 2%. In fact, the Company’s business in China has enjoyed double-digit growth for 5 years in succession, the business growth of 2008 reached as high as 19%.

On Jun 23, Coca-Cola’s 37th bottling plant in China – COFCO Coca-Cola Beverage (Jiangxi) Co., Ltd. – opened in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province. Mr. Muhtar Kent attended the opening ceremony. Located in Xiaolan Economic Development Zone in the suburb of Nanchang and covering an area of 0.147 million m2, the plant is exclusively invested by COFCO Coca-Cola Beverages Co., Ltd., with the first-stage investment totaling 0.1 billion yuan RMB. 

Equipped with an imported plastic bottling line, the plant has a planned annual capacity of 120 thousand tons (0.5 billion bottles, 20 million standard packaging cases).

Moreover, a new Coca-Cola bottling plant is to be opened on Jun 24 in Urumqi, Xinjiang, and one plant will break earth in Huhhot, Inner Mongolia, the construction of which is expected to complete by 2010. All these indicate that the world’s beverage giant will inject more money into Central and Western China.

“We choose Nanchang, Urumqi and Huhhot to answer the Chinese government’s call of supporting the investment and economic development in Central and Western China,” said Mr. Muhtar Kent. At the time these bottling plants are set up, Coca-Cola’s bottling plants will distribute over all China’s provincial administrative regions excluding Guizhou, Qinghai, Ningxia and Tibet.

He said that the new plant in Jiangxi will need over 400 employees and provide more than 4,000 jobs indirectly to the suppliers and distributors in the province. A similar number of employees will also be needed for the plant in Xinjiang.

“We have focused on providing indirect jobs when considering an investment. As a matter of fact, wherever we make investments, a direct job will mean 10 indirect jobs for our supply chain, for example, for the manufacturers of bottles, trucks and refrigerators,” Mr. Muhtar Kent added.

When unveiling the Coca-Cola Global R&D Center in Shanghai in Mar, 2009, Mr. Muhtar Kent expressed that the Coca-Cola Company will make investments of over 2 billion USD in China in the future 3 years for new bottling plants, the expansion of the markets and business, and so on. The new plants in Nanchang, Urumqi and Huhhot are just what the Company has done for fulfilling its promises.

“All these clearly indicate that the Coca-Cola Company is confident of the future of China, highly confident,” he said.

China has become Coca-Cola’s 3rd largest market in 206 countries and regions around the world. At present, the Company has in China more than 6 million outlets and over 30 thousand employees.