Most business leaders have probably heard of the stoush between China and smaller Asian neighbours over disputed islands to Australia's north, but it's doubtful many have considered the standoff through a commercial lens.
So executives and directors may be stirred from their apathy on the South China Sea by a warning from Kurt Campbell, the former United States assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs.
"This is now the central most-important strategic waterway in the world by tonnage and by value," Campbell said at a gathering in Washington last week.
"If these areas start to become judged more dangerous or difficult, it suddenly alters the equation of commerce fundamentally."
Campbell is not only an Asia expert, credited with being the key architect of President Barack Obama and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton's "pivot" or "rebalance" to Asia. For an academic and former Pentagon official, he brings a commercial and economic perspective to the South China Sea dispute.
He serves on the board of one of Asia's biggest banks, Standard Chartered, and runs a strategy and capital advisory group to corporations with interests in Asia. His wife Lael Brainard is a member of the US Federal Reserve board and former under secretary of the US Treasury for international affairs.
Free trade is an underpinning of the modern international economy. The South China Sea wrangle cannot be simply shoved off into a black box for the foreign affairs wonks to debate. It should be on the radar of importers and exporters in the region.
Almost 30 per cent of the $US19 trillion in global trade passes through the South China Sea. It is the vital link between the Pacific and Indian oceans.
Australian mining commodities, agriculture and other goods are among the merchandise shipped via the South China Sea.
Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop said in Boston this month that freedom of navigation on the sea is critical because about two-thirds of Australia's merchandise trade passes through the South China Sea. She had just held a meeting with US Secretary of State John Kerry, where they discussed a range of security, diplomatic and economic issues.
Any day now, barring a backdown, the US navy is expected to sail a "freedom of navigation" exercise within 12 nautical miles of disputed reefs and artificial islands in the Spratly archipelago to challenge China's territorial claims.
Freedom of navigation and commerce runs deep in the American national psyche. The first time the US navy used force on the seas was the First Barbary War in 1801-05, when president Thomas Jefferson refused to have American traders pay tribute to north African states for passage via the western Mediterranean waters.
Since late 2013, China has been belligerently dredging and building facilities on reefs and rocks, in a land reclamation covering about 1173 hectares.
The Pentagon points out that Beijing has reclaimed 17 times as much land in two years as other claimants Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Taiwan and Brunei over the previous 40 years.
The US does not take sides on who has sovereignty of the artificial islands, but wants it resolved via international arbitration.
China presumably feels it is protecting its own commercial interests by aggressively claiming ownership of the territory. More than 40 per cent of China's GDP comes from trade and 90 per cent of its trade travels by sea.
The South China Sea has oil and gas reserves, perhaps more than 100 million barrels, in what amounts to a potential mini-Asian Persian Gulf. China is the world's largest importer of energy.
Jacqueline Deal, chief executive of defence consultancy Long Term Strategy Group, says there is a global competition to "lock up resources and dominate key transportation routes".
The big concern, of course, is about Beijing militarising the artificial islands. The construction of airstrips and other facilities is a signal this may already be occurring.
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