On the sandy plains east of Beijing, The World is in trouble. The property development was supposed to bring five continents, in the form of artificial islands, to scrubby farmland near the booming city of Tianjin.
Instead, the enormous project, which is about three times the size of New York’s Central Park, exemplifies both the excesses and more recent sharp downturn in China’s property market.
Asia and North America’s villas and tower blocks are mostly finished, but only about 20 homes out of thousands of units are occupied. And with the developer running out of funds, construction has virtually ground to a halt, leaving Europe, Africa and South America in varying states of underdevelopment.