Ageing China offers silver lining for investors

                                         ——Reuters 14 Jan. 2011
                                                              By Jane Lanhee Lee and Lucy Hornby 
   SHANGHAI/BEIJING, Jan 14 (Reuters)

   Retired professor  Chen Chongwu and his wife Liu Zhenjuan dreamed of coming back  to China from their daughter's home in France, but until last  year the couple had nowhere to go. 
   That changed when they found Cherish-Yearn, an upscale  retirement community on the fringes of Shanghai and a pioneer  in catering to China's prosperous elderly. 
   Businesses are just starting to tap the rapidly expanding  senior citizens' market -- China's new silver industry. 
    "Every year we would come back to China, and we would  visit retirement homes. But we couldn't find anything," said  79-year-old Chen, a history professor who specialized in the  French revolution. 
   "When we finally found this place we felt we could return." 
   China's traditional model of children living with their  elderly parents is under siege, thanks to 30 years of the  one-child policy and rapid urban migration. 
   Leaving their daughter's home in France, Liu, 74, and  Chong paid 690,000 yuan (US$104,545) to move into a three-room  apartment on Cherish-Yearn's beautifully sculpted campus. 
   An annual fee of 88,000 yuan covers basic medical and  cleaning services, and various activities.    

China had 169 million people over 60 by the end of 2009,  or 12 percent of the population. That number will jump to 250  million people by 2025. 
   And their spending power is rising. Chinese senior  citizens command about 300 billion to 400 billion yuan in  annual disposable income, according to Kunal Sinha, chief  knowledge officer at marketing firm Ogilvy & Mather in Shanghai. 
   That will rise to 5 trillion yuan over the next three  decades. 
   "The whole marketing world is obsessed with young people.  The reality for China, the demographic change, is that in 15  years' time, the number of young people is going to halve,  it's going to be 50 percent of what it is today," Sinha told  Reuters. 
   "The number of senior people is only going to double."  
   HYPERMARKETS AT THE FOREFRONT 
   Hypermarkets in China's megacities have caught on to the  fact that senior citizens are the main grocery shoppers in the  family, sending morning buses and offering discounts to lure  them in. 
   But apart from health supplement makers, few other  industries in China are working to earn their silver dollars. 
   Still, in recent years there's been a sudden pick up in  investment in senior homes and so-called "silver towns". 
   Yoko Marikawa, a Japanese consultant specializing in the  seniors' industry, says nearly 50 of her Chinese clients have  launched or are planning to launch retirement communities  across China with total investments expected to be between  15-25 billion yuan. 
   French catering and hotel firm Sodexo <EXHO.PA> is in  talks with the Chinese government for similar services, an  executive said. 
   But most foreign firms and funds are still waiting for the  government to issue standards on facilities and services. 
   "Investors still don't know which standards are good. If  they invest in the facility now and later the government  announces some other standard, they're all out. They would  have to rebuild or change some facilities," Marikawa said. 
   Cherish-Yearn chairman Xi Zhiyong is ready to take on that  risk as he bets on the future of the industry. He invested 600  million yuan in Cherish-Yearn, which opened in 2008. 
   His new business even helped him deal with personal  problems. 
   "I started this because I personally felt the need. One  year my mother was hospitalized 11 times. Each time I was on a  business trip and would receive a call from her and would have  to come back," he said. Now, his parents, his in-laws, and his  brother and sister's in-laws all live in the new compound. 
   So far 300 of the 500 finished units are occupied, and  interest is high, said Xi. Revenue in 2010 rose to 150 million  yuan from 110 million yuan in 2009, and the final project will  include more than 800 apartments. 
   "The main risk is that we are still a little early. The  parents of the first children of the one child policy will  reach 70 in about five years," says Xi, adding that the  international average age for people in retirement homes is  71.5 years. 
   A steady inflow of cash from these homes for the elderly  is a much more attractive business model than straight out  property development deals, especially as new restrictions  make land and funding harder to find, said Xi, who started out  in traditional real estate.       
   REAL ESTATE OPPORTUNITY 
   China's biggest property developer, Vanke <000002.SZ>, is  also launching four retirement projects, including one in the  country's smoggy capital, Beijing. 
   "In many of the older Vanke developments, about 30 percent  of the residents are elders living alone -- empty nesters. So  we're looking into different ways of meeting their needs,"  said chairman Wang Shi, who himself is 59 and an active  mountaineer. 
   Vanke's new retirement developments will be rental  properties, marking a new business model for the company. 
   Retirement communities are still a rarity in China, and  upscale ones even more so. Less than 2 percent of China's  elderly live in nursing homes, according to Ninie Wang, a  government advisor on ageing and founder of Pinetree Services,  which provides services to elders at their homes. 
   China can't muster the comprehensive financial support  offered in Europe or North America, so it favours options that  allow the elderly to stay in their own homes . 
   "The government is now developing a whole system to  provide support services that enable people to stay in their  communities and in their own homes," Wang said. 
   Retirement homes and communities could foster other  businesses for seniors. Already at Cherish-Yearn, American  firm Aramark handles the cleaning, French firm Sodexo runs the  canteen, and Hong Kong's Mega Fit operates the gym. 
   Xi expects these companies to follow him on his expansion  into four new complexes across China. 
   "I studied Walmart. It's basically a big platform for  manufacturers to sell their goods," Xi said. 
   "I am a big platform for service providers to sell their  service. That means I can expand quickly and offer a high  level of service."  ($1=6.619 Yuan)  ((Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)