During his keynote address to the US-based International Tire Exhibition and Conference on 18 September, Giti Tire executive chairman and PT Gajah Tunggal Tbk director Dr. Enki Tan shared that China’s tyre market faces a number of changes in the coming years. He referred to the growth of the middle class and increasing numbers of younger consumers in China; he said that incomes in China are rising – workers’ average wages are expected to rise from five per cent of the US average to 25 per cent – and opined that the most significant change will come through the Chinese government’s target of raising domestic consumption to reach 61 per cent of the country’s GDP by 2022.
