Fancy a meal at the Petrochemical Family Restaurant? How about a post-dinner film at the Petrochemical Movie Theatre?
Doesn't sound too appealing -- except to 140,000 people living in this small industrial city south of Shanghai.
Here, "petrochemical" is synonymous with the comforts of home and adorns the storefronts of everything from tour agencies to credit unions and department stores -- such as the Petrochemical Hundred Goods Store on the main street.
Built from the ground up, the city of Shihua, literally "Petrochemical", is typical of the self-contained industrial megaplexes that have sprang up across China over the decades.
It might pass for any Chinese town, except that a quarter of Shihua labors for Shanghai Petrochemical, China's largest petrochemical firm and a subsidiary of oil giant Sinopec Corp.
A model of central planning, this gritty city comes complete with corporate sponsored schools, ports, hospitals, discos and businesses. For two decades, the firm held absolute control over Shihua's every aspect -- including its police force and courts.
But as state enterprises like Shanghai Petrochemical divorce themselves from providing cradle-to-grave services along the old centrally planned model, and Shanghai's government throws its weight behind a multi-billion dollar chemical complex nearby, aging Petrochemical's days in the sun appear numbered.
Residents, confronted with the changing times, recall the good old days when just about everyone worked for the same employer and they could escape Beijing's scrutiny at times.
"We're just a small little town, so everything was ours," said Tao Shuping, a retired Shanghai Petrochemical worker in her 50s. "I think the company did a good job managing the place."
Shihua began life as little more than a pebble beach. Shanghai Petrochemical picked out the site in 1972 from a barren expanse. Surveyors, trudging barefoot through the mud, stuck flags into the soggy earth marking the city limits.
Its first phase was completed in 1979 and later construction transformed Shihua into the bustling town it is now. Workers in identical white shirts still bicycle to and from the factories in street-clogging waves.
Shihua enjoyed a small town cosiness. During annual Lunar New Year's eve festivals people cast aside company-issue uniforms to throng streets in their best clothes, mingling with lion dancers and exploding firecrackers.
Customers used to chalk up credit for anything from medical bills to household provisions, settling them with the firm later.
"Those were good times. It used to be so much better. In the old days my salary was higher," said Zhou Ping, a shop assistant who worked for Shihua's patron for nearly 20 years.
For years, the corporate-sponsored perks helped people endure life minutes away from the towering smokestacks that belch yellow smoke and a labyrinth of grime-streaked pipes used to transport toxic gas.
Parents warned children to steer clear of the factories. Schools required pupils to drink milk daily in the belief it would clear their systems of toxins, residents say.
"The air isn't very clean and there's this peculiar smell," said Shihua-born salesgirl Zhi Jiawei, 21.
But life began to change in the 1990s as China pushed state enterprise reform in a bid to ease their costly welfare burdens and shatter the "iron rice bowl."
In 1993, Shanghai Petrochemical became the first Chinese company to list American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) in New York. As they streamlined the firm and prepared to list, executives transferred the costly ownership of schools, hospitals and services to local officials, spelling an end to the perks.
"Everything has been passed to the local government, so we have to pay for services like everybody else," said Shanghai Petrochemical vice president Rong Guangdao.
For China, Shihua's transformation was ahead of the times. Yangzi Petrochemical still runs a factory town near Nanjing, and giant steelmaker Baosteel a community in northern Shanghai. Both still manage their own television stations and hospitals.
Now, for Shihua, another threat is emerging that looks likely to siphon off residents and investment.
Just 12km away, Shanghai aims to attract 100 billion yuan (US$12 billion) in investment by 2010 in a massive modern chemical park it hopes will become Asia's biggest petrochemical production base.
Oil supermajors have already given their thumbs-up. BP Amoco, Sinopec and Shanghai Petrochemical are sinking US$2.7 billion into a 900,000 tonne-per-year naphtha cracker plant that will start up by 2005. Other investors include German firms BASG AG and Bayer AG.
The new complex will avoid the old Communist central planning model -- and cast a dark shadow on Shihua.
"It's not the old model like Shanghai Petchem -- that wouldn't be wise. It would be a big social burden for them," said a petrochemical analyst with a major foreign brokerage.
"Perhaps in future, Shanghai Petchem will move its headquarters to the park. I think it's just a matter of time."
Shihua residents say Shanghai Petrochemical has already begun shifting employees to the new location. Now, they cling mainly to the nostalgia of one of China's most prominent company towns -- with the petrochemicals and odors, but without the perks.
"Nothing much has changed here, the facilities in our homes are still the same and the equipment in factories is ageing," Tao said. "I think it's great living here."
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