In Europe, Moscow is probably the most dynamic city which sees changes everyday. More and more skyscrapers are erected among the old buildings or in the green forests. As the fastest changing city in Europe, Moscow now has a strong Chinese imprint - Chinese workers are building Tower A of its tallest building - the Complex Federation.

Chinese win the bid for Europe's tallest building

To build the tallest building in Europe has been a dream of the people in Moscow. Due to the period of economic difficulty in the 1990's this grand project for development was constantly put aside and became regarded as a ��day dream'. However, in recent years because Russia has earned a lot of money by selling oil the dream can now be realized. At the end of last year by the river bay of Moscow, the project was finally started.

On July 2005, General Construction Corporation of China signed a contract with a Russian company for the construction of Tower A of the Complex Federation. Designed to be 354 meters high with nearly 100 floors, the tower will be the tallest building in Europe and the world's tallest building built completely with steel concrete structure. With a total of 58 million US dollars investment, the structural construction will be completed by 2008.

Since the Complex Federation is a large project being contracted in Russia for China's Construction industry it was not easy to contract such a project. Due to its symbolic significance, Russia has paid great attention to this building and invited bids for it by a dozen truly internationally competitive companies. The main reason for the Chinese company wining the bid among its European and American competitors is due to its strength. When Russians knew that the General Construction Corporation of China had been among the world largest contractors for 20 consecutive years and has been appraised as the world top ten housing construction contractors for ten consecutive years, it was able to hand the project over to the Chinese with confidence. As well as this, the rich experience in international construction projects been helpful to the Chinese company as it has cooperated with many international contractors including those in the US, Britain, France, Germany and Japan. They have built a number of symbolic buildings such as the Hong Kong New Airport, the International Convention Center in Cairo, Sheraton Hotel in Algeria and a grand hotel in the US. In addition, the Chinese Embassy has played an important role to Moscow in setting up links between the two sides.

Chinese workers are going through many tests

Before winning the bid, the Russian construction market was almost closed to the Chinese people. The new market has brought about a lot of unexpected difficulties for the Chinese. First of all, the project itself is challenging. In order to prevent terrorist attacks such as the 9.11 incident the project will use high standard concrete designed to be fire-resistant for 10 hours, even though such concrete has never been used in Europe. The Chinese construction team has to try to design and produce this themselves. The cold winter in Moscow will also prove to be a serious test for the project.

The management of hundreds of workers and their lives is also a big problem, not to mention Moscow's bitterly cold winter and the large discrepancies in food, which are a big problem for everyone. Without a doubt the most difficult part is how to adapt to Russia's culture and society. Russian construction laws and regulations are very different from Chinese ones.

At the beginning of the project, the company even encountered some unreasonable problems caused by the local people as some Russians only regarded Chinese businessmen as those who are out to sell commodities in the big Russian markets. They were suspicious because the Chinese are now contracting Europe's tallest building and looked on suspiciously at China's construction competitiveness.

The Russians are finally moved by the Chinese

As the first large Chinese construction company will contract projects in the Russian market, the quality of the Complex Federation will play an important role on whether Chinese enterprises can smoothly enter the Russian market. It is also important to set up a good image for future Chinese companies in Russia. The project manager said that they pay great attention to this project. Most workers are well selected in China and some technicians are even selected from the current Olympic Games construction projects for a certain time. Chinese Ambassador Liu Guchang often inquires about the project and repeatedly requires the company to pay attention to the quality. The big boss in China, general manager Ji Jiaming also visits the Moscow construction site every month to supervise the progress of the project.

The Russians have been moved by the Chinese people's consideration and serious intentions. Some Russian technicians working in the Chinese company have begun to feel proud to be members of the Chinese construction company. As time progresses, some developers have begun to take the initiative to talk with the increasingly popular company so that the company recently received an 80 million US dollar contract for building a glass factory and a 70 million dollar project called Moscow Business Center in the capital of Khazakstan, Astana.

By People's Daily Online