Zhong Shanshan
Source of wealth: Beverages, pharmaceuticals
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Biography
Zhong Shanshan is the founder and chairman of Nongfu Spring, a bottled water company that listed its shares in Hong Kong in 2020.
Hangzhou-born Zhong dropped out of elementary school during China's chaotic Cultural Revolution.
He later had jobs as a construction worker, a newspaper reporter and a beverage sales agent before starting his own business.
Zhong also controls Wantai Biological, which makes rapid diagnostic tests for infectious diseases including Covid-19.
His son Zhong Shu Zi is a non-executive director at Nongfu.
Perspective on their fortune
Gold
Everyday luxury
A Zhong Shanshan's fortune is equivalent to 450 of gold, but this may be difficult to value, as we don't usually have a handful of gold bars in our piggy bank.
A standard gold ring typically weighs between 4 and 7 grams. Let's say this one weighs 5 grams. It's usually 18k gold.
Based on today's gold price (not taking into account the jeweler's fee, shipping, or anything else), that gold ring would be worth $556.3
Zhong Shanshan could buy 120,128,729 gold rings. That's a lot of fingers and a lot of gifts!!
And if the number of rings is difficult to visualize, all these rings would need 21 trucks to transport them, But we can be almost certain that Zhong Shanshan will have enough left over to pay for the gas for those trucks.
Health
The price of life
Let's compare Zhong Shanshan's fortune with the healthcare spending of a huge country
Zhong Shanshan could fund the entire healthcare system of DR Congo with a population of over 105,800,000 of inhabitants for approximately 30.1 years.
But even if we compare their fortune to that of a rich country
At the other extreme, Zhong Shanshan could cover the health expenditure of Luxembourg, considered the world's most heavily invested health system, for 13.3 years
Education
Buying the future
Lowest education spending
Zhong Shanshan could assume the entire cost of the education system of Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, with more than 243,000,000 inhabitants for 19.7 years.
Highest education spending
But not only could he assume the cost of a poor country, Luxembourg is considered the country with the highest per capita investment in education in the world, Zhong Shanshan could pay for it in full for 26.7 years.
Research
The monopoly of progress
Lowest research spending
Zhong Shanshan could fully fund the state research budget of Pakistan, the fifth most populous country in the world with more than 260,000,000 of inhabitants, for 112.5 years.
Highest research spending
But even if we compare the total wealth of Zhong Shanshan with Israel, the country that currently invests the most per capita in research in the world, it could assume the total cost of the system for 2.5 years.
Financial Assets
Monthly wealth history
Fortune comparison
Historical data not available for comparison