Wang Yang, the party secretary of China's most populous province, is the country's answer to Arnold Schwarzenegger, only he is more powerful. The Chinese Communist party's point man in southern Guangdong province is also having a better crisis than the California governor.

Like California, Guangdong is the incubator of a large, innovative and dynamic economy far from Beijing and Shanghai, China's centres of political and financial power. With an official population of 95.4m, it leads the country in economic output and exports, though the latter have fallen about 20 per cent from pre-crisis levels.

Mr Wang, 54, says the shake-out is an opportunity to revolutionise Guangdong's traditionally labour-intensive manufacturing sector, which during the past 30 years has transformed the region from an agricultural backwater into an economic locomotive.