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• Here’s how China can fund its third plenum goal of high-quality development
• Philippines, China reach deal in effort to stop clashes at fiercely disputed shoal
• Can China and the West agree on global AI rules amid existential risks?
• China’s third plenum sees Communist Party double down on economic, tech, military power
• China and the Philippines reach deal in effort to stop clashes at fiercely disputed shoal
• First Hong Kong e-commerce festival to help city brands expand into mainland China to be held
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Here’s how China can fund its third plenum goal of high-quality development

https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3271059/heres-how-china-can-fund-its-third-plenum-goal-high-quality-development?utm_source=rss_feed

The recently concluded third plenum of the Central Committee reconfirmed President Xi Jinping’s priority to promote “high-quality development”, a euphemism for innovation and technological advancement. The leadership also highlighted geopolitical and domestic risks and financial consolidation given the pressures on local governments and the banking system.

For China, national security concerns now override many economic considerations. But for global financial markets and the foreign policy community, the immediate need is to resuscitate the economy by stimulating demand and acting more decisively on oft-stated reforms including support for the private sector and foreign investment.

Can these contrasting objectives be reconciled? The answer is yes, but only if Beijing achieves the right balance by implementing a set of reforms that would quickly bolster productivity and GDP growth at little or no financial cost to the state.

There is a major disconnect between the on-the-ground realities in China and the wishes of external China-watchers looking for tangible evidence the authorities will support a more market-friendly growth strategy. This explains why China’s equity markets have underperformed global averages.

While tepid second-quarter economic results might raise concern among officials, strong exports and robust manufacturing are seen as good enough to realise this year’s growth target of around 5 per cent. Calls for an expansionary programme on the scale of what China carried out for the 2008 global financial crisis are unrealistic given the country’s weakened financial position after the Covid-19 pandemic and years of smaller stimulus efforts.

The distressed property market is the result of local authorities relying too heavily on property development to fund their spending obligations given inadequate budgetary revenues. Thus, the most urgent priority is comprehensive fiscal reform with the dual purpose of securing more revenue and aligning the spending responsibilities of central and local authorities with their available financing. References to fiscal reforms were part of the third plenum discussions, but their realisation remains uncertain.

For the foreign policy and academic community, many of the reforms highlighted in the third plenum discussions are seen as tinkering around the edges. They are institutional and regulatory refinements rather than sending a clear signal that market forces, not the state, will take the lead in guiding private sector activities, which was a point underscored in the 2013 third plenum.

But China’s goal of becoming more technologically self-sufficient is largely state-driven and reinforced by the increasing tensions with the United States. Pouring more resources into hi-tech activities could be risky since many endeavours might not succeed or, if they do, will only show results years later.

With both central and local government budgets under pressure and banks struggling to absorb the recent build-up in non-performing loans, the problem lies in finding enough money to fund these initiatives while also supporting more traditional social programmes to sustain growth in consumption. Thus, the challenge is implementing reforms that generate immediate increases in productivity and growth without weakening the government’s financial position.

The most obvious solution is abolishing China’s outdated hukou system, a vestige of the centrally planned economy that was designed to manage the movement of households by restricting their access to locally provided social services. Liberalising the hukou system used to be seen as an equity issue, but in the run-up to the third plenum, the economic implications have become just as important.

Migrant households have a higher savings rate than households with hukou given that they cannot access local services and buy property. Giving some 300 million migrants full residency rights would ratchet up consumption demand and stimulate GDP growth at little cost to local governments since their increased spending would buoy tax revenues and uplift the depressed property market.

Significant liberalisation of the hukou system has occurred in recent years, but only in small and medium-sized cities. Freeing up larger cities, especially megacities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen, would not only spur consumption but also labour productivity. According to the World Bank’s Urban China report, larger cities tend to have higher labour productivity.

Rebalancing the regional allocation of public investment is also worth considering. Addressing regional disparities has been a high priority in alleviating poverty. This has led to an increase in investment relative to regional GDP for the far western provinces.

While progress has been made in terms of redistribution and poverty reduction, the returns on investment in these remote provinces are much lower than for the rest of the country. This has contributed to the steady decline in China’s GDP growth rate in the past decade. Some rebalancing of the regional allocation of public investment in favour of higher returns elsewhere would generate more rapid national growth at no additional cost to the budget.

Similarly, rates of return on assets for state-owned and private firms were roughly similar in the years before the global financial crisis, but the gap has widened considerably in favour of private firms in the past decade and a half. A more disciplined reallocation allowing private firms to secure a larger share would lead to more rapid growth at no cost to the state.

These examples support the principle of allowing market forces to determine the best use of resources by allowing labour to seek better employment opportunities and spend in line with needs, and for capital to move to regions and activities with higher returns.

With China’s growth rate steadily trending downwards and the huge costs of promoting technological advancement and resuscitating the property market, Beijing needs to act on growth-enhancing reforms that will not add to its current financial difficulties.

Philippines, China reach deal in effort to stop clashes at fiercely disputed shoal

https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/southeast-asia/article/3271310/philippines-china-reach-deal-effort-stop-clashes-fiercely-disputed-shoal?utm_source=rss_feed

The Philippines and China reached a deal they hoped would end confrontations at the most fiercely disputed shoal in the South China Sea, the Philippine government said on Sunday.

The Philippines occupies Second Thomas Shoal but China also claims it, and increasingly hostile clashes at sea have sparked fears of larger conflicts that could involve the United States.

The crucial deal was reached on Sunday, after a series of meetings between Philippine and Chinese diplomats in Manila and exchanges of diplomatic notes that aimed to establish a mutually acceptable arrangement at the shoal without conceding either side’s territorial claims. Two Philippine officials, who have knowledge of the negotiations, confirmed the deal on condition of anonymity and the government later issued a brief statement announcing the deal without providing details.

“Both sides continue to recognise the need to de-escalate the situation in the South China Sea and manage differences through dialogue and consultation and agree that the agreement will not prejudice each other’s positions in the South China Sea,” the Department of Foreign Affairs in Manila said.

China has disputes with several governments over land and sea borders, many of them in the South China Sea, and the rare deal with the Philippines could spark hope that similar arrangements could be forged by Beijing with other rival countries to avoid clashes while thorny territorial issues remain unresolved. It remains to be seen, however, if the deal could be implemented successfully and how long it will last.

Chinese coastguard and other forces have used powerful water cannons and dangerous blocking manoeuvres to prevent food and other supplies from reaching Filipino navy personnel at Manila’s outpost at the shoal.

The years-long territorial stand-off at the shoal has flared repeatedly since last year between Chinese coastguard, navy and suspected militia ships and Philippine coastguard-escorted navy boats transporting food, water and fresh navy and marine personnel to an outpost on a long-grounded and rusting warship, the BRP Sierra Madre.

In the worst confrontation, Chinese forces on motorboats repeatedly rammed and then boarded two Philippine navy boats on June 17 to prevent Filipino personnel from transferring food and other supplies including firearms to the ship outpost in the shallows of the shoal, according to the Philippine government.

After repeated ramming, the Chinese seized the Philippine navy boats and damaged them with machetes and improvised spears. They also seized seven M4 rifles, which were packed in cases, and other supplies. The violent face-off wounded several Filipino navy personnel, including one who lost his thumb, in a chaotic skirmish that was captured in video and photos that were later made public by Philippine officials.

China and the Philippines blamed each other for the confrontation and each asserted their own sovereign rights over the shoal, which Filipinos call Ayungin and the Chinese call Ren’ai Jiao.

The United States and its key Asian and Western allies, including Japan and Australia, condemned the Chinese acts at the shoal and called for the rule of law and freedom of navigation to be upheld in the South China Sea, a key global trade route with rich fishing areas and undersea gas deposits.

In addition to China and the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan have been locked in separate but increasingly tense territorial disputes in the waterway, which is regarded as a potential flashpoint and a delicate fault line in the US-China regional rivalry. The US military has deployed navy ships and fighter jets for decades in what it calls freedom of navigation and overflight patrols, which China has opposed and regards as a threat to regional stability.

Washington has no territorial claims in the disputed waters but has repeatedly warned that it is obliged to defend the Philippines, its oldest treaty ally in Asia, if Filipino forces, ships and aircraft come under an armed attack, including in the South China Sea.

One of the two Philippine officials said the June 17 confrontation prompted Beijing and Manila to hasten on-and-off talks on an arrangement that would prevent confrontations at Second Thomas Shoal.

During final meetings in the last four days, two Chinese demands that had been key sticking points were removed from the draft deal.

China had previously said it would allow food, water and other basic supplies to be transported by the Philippines to its forces in the shoal if Manila agreed not to bring construction materials to fortify the crumbling ship, and to give China advance notice and the right to inspect the ships for those materials, the officials said.

The Philippines rejected those conditions, and the final deal did not include them.

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Can China and the West agree on global AI rules amid existential risks?

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3271294/can-china-and-west-agree-global-ai-rules-amid-existential-risks?utm_source=rss_feed

As major powers rush to draw up a global framework to govern the development and use of artificial intelligence (AI), differences in political ideologies and values between China and the West could undermine progress, observers believe.

Specifically, China’s domestic use of the emerging technology coupled with Beijing’s perception of the risks it entails remain highly divergent from those of Western countries, analysts have suggested, an issue that could prove problematic as countries work towards an alignment that helps to formulate an international rule book on AI.

Nan Jia, an associate professor of strategic management at the USC Marshall School of Business, said the differing roles that governments serve in China and Western countries would be key factors in the development of AI.

In the West, AI technologies are primarily being developed by private tech firms to serve companies and individuals, motivated by the goal of achieving market dominance.

But that is not entirely the case in China. “The Chinese government is actually in the game of developing AI,” Jia said.

While Chinese tech giants like Baidu and Tencent are also aiming for market dominance, the Chinese government is much more heavily involved in the actual development of AI technologies compared to those in Western economies.

The intervention of Chinese authorities at the development level is based mainly on Beijing’s desire to use such technologies for mass surveillance, and to improve domestic technological expertise to reduce dependence on Western technology, according to Jia.

“Because China’s goals are vastly different [from the West’s] – one is to succeed in the market, the other is to use methods to strengthen control and also flex their strengths and showcase their supremacy – you can imagine their concerns are naturally going to be different,” Jia added.

The contrarian views – and concerns – of China and the West were spotlighted during a symposium in Beijing in June, when Zhang Linghan, a professor at the Institute of Data Law at China University of Political Science and Law, indicated that different countries had “different perspectives, histories and frameworks of laws”.

While countries could learn from each other’s regulations, she said differences between the European Union and China “cannot [be] ignored”, adding that some risks that were highlighted in Europe were in fact acceptable and legal in China.

“It is [due to] the difference in culture and the difference of situation,” said Zhang, who sits on a United Nations high-level advisory body on AI.

At the same symposium, an European diplomat elaborated on the EU Artificial Intelligence Act (AI Act) adopted in May, as well as the bloc’s priorities in the regulation of AI.

Marjut Hannonen, head of the European Union’s trade delegation to Beijing, said Europe’s “most critical” concerns were to ensure that the safety and fundamental rights of its citizens would be safeguarded.

Under the act, applications deemed too dangerous – including those that manipulate people’s free will or have uses for social surveillance – are banned. “We don’t allow that,” Hannonen said.

You Chuanman, director of the Centre for Regulation and Global Governance under the Institute for International Affairs at the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s Shenzhen campus, stressed the roles of “cultural differences” between China and the West, particularly in terms of human rights.

The distinctions could translate into significant hurdles when countries sit down to discuss global rules over the use of technologies involving facial recognition or surveillance, simply based on how the different governments operate.

Matt Sheehan, a fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, who researches issues in global technology, said the Chinese government’s top concern over AI was how it would affect online content and information.

Its earliest binding regulations, he said, focused on the role of the emerging technology in the creation and dissemination of content, including both recommendation algorithms and AI-generated content.

“China says these regulations are aimed at creating a healthy online environment, but experts in the US and EU would just call it censorship,” he said.

Jia, with the USC Marshall School of Business, said Western governments were typically concerned with issues like privacy, transparency, bias, fairness and accountability – concerns that stemmed from individual users of the technologies and activists.

“In China, with the Chinese government, its goal is maybe to have effective surveillance and there does not exist an activist community to ‘bug you’,” she said.

“A lot of the concerns that are high on the regulator’s mind in Western countries … are not relevant as there are no such underlying forces trying to achieve them in the China context.”

The divergence represented a “fundamental difference in values” between China and most liberal democracies in the West, said Weifeng Zhong, an affiliated scholar at George Mason University’s Mercatus Centre.

In the West, civil liberties take priority, and the use of AI – and more broadly of technology – must respect that.

In contrast, under Chinese governance, technology was supposed to serve the “greater, collective good, but what is good for society is often determined by the regime,” Zhong said.

“That is why AI-powered surveillance in China can easily serve oppressive purposes in the name of enhancing safety and order. We have seen this divide since the dawn of the internet, and the gulf in the age of AI will only be larger.”

Jia called China’s conflicting approach with the West – specifically, its domestic governance of AI – a reflection of an “underlying gap in ideology” which would only grow bigger in a world fraught with geopolitical rivalries, as well as a potential hiccup that could slow global progress toward unified AI regulation.

“It will be surprising actually if [countries] can easily achieve agreements over regulatory issues and the governance of AI,” she said, adding that an absence of trust between China and the West could make agreeing on global rules increasingly difficult.

“AI is the facade of geopolitical tensions. This is not just a technology [issue]. It’s deeply intertwined with politics.”

Zhong said the current debates around risks in AI mirrored the broader differences in the views on human rights and freedoms – which China and the West still debate – adding that he was not optimistic that the two sides would resolve their differences any time soon.

What then would the global governance of AI look like? It might follow a similar path as that of the internet, he suggested.

“The Chinese regime has a very different view from the West on information and how freely it should be able to flow domestically and across borders. The result of that divide is now a rather fractured World Wide Web,” he said.

“There was a time earlier on in China’s economic reforms when it appeared as though China would become an open society, but that ship seems to have sailed.”

Over the past year, China has signalled its ambitions to play a bigger role in setting global rules and standards over AI, and it has sought greater cooperation on the emerging technology with other countries.

At the China-Africa Internet Development and Cooperation Forum in April, both sides recognised the need to cooperate more on AI, calling for more technology research, development and applications, as well as increased dialogue.

Earlier in October, China proposed its own framework – the Global AI Governance Initiative – which calls for equal rights on AI development for all countries and joint efforts to tackle the misuse of technologies by terrorists.

Chinese Premier Li Qiang this month called for more inclusive development of AI, urging countries to bridge an “intelligence gap” and to work together to foster a “fair and open” environment so that more countries could benefit from the emerging technology.

In one recent example of cooperation between China and the West, the UN General Assembly adopted a China-sponsored resolution this month urging the international community to ensure that developing nations have equal opportunities to benefit from AI.

The non-binding resolution was co-sponsored by more than 140 countries, including the United States.

You, from the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s Shenzhen campus, called the resolution an achievement, saying that it was a “small step” for countries to move forward with.

“That is also how global governance achieves its goal. We start with areas in which we do not dispute or disagree with each other … we build the foundation, then along the way try to find other consensus,” he said.

But other aspects of AI – such as military applications – might be increasingly difficult for countries to agree on, given that AI is now considered by many governments as a national priority.

“It is one of the most important technologies of the 21st century geopolitical struggle,” You said.

Still, despite the deep-seated differences between Chinese and Western societies, there could be areas of shared interests that they could cooperate on, even if they are limited.

Apart from issues such as access to AI for developing economies – which was included in the recent UN resolution – You suggested that countries could mutually explore topics surrounding the energy resources needed to sustain future AI innovations.

Zhong suggested collaboration on mitigating potential existential risks to humans that advanced AI could deliver, adding that such a threat should be something even countries with very different values could stand behind.

Sheehan, from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, suggested that the “only hope” for global governance of AI was if countries focused on a “very narrow set of problems” where every country had an interest in resolving them.

One example is the proliferation of powerful AI systems – like those used to turbocharge hacking capabilities – to non-state actors around the world.

“Both the US and China will be using AI systems to hack each other, but neither country wants those systems to be in the hands of terrorists or criminal syndicates,” he said.

Jeffrey Ding, an assistant professor of political science at George Washington University, added that there was still potential for proactive global governance on AI safety issues despite the different domestic regulatory approaches.

“Even during the most intense periods of the Cold War, the US still cooperated with the Soviet Union on nuclear safety and security issues because it was in everyone’s national security interest to avoid accidental or unauthorised nuclear detonations,” he said.

“Similarly, when it comes to controlling powerful AI systems … there is ample room for international cooperation and coordination.”

Jia said that while it would be a tall order for China to build a consensus with the West on some issues, including those that might appear to endanger the Chinese government’s grip on power, conversations should still take place.

“Without conversation, there’s zero probability of finding common ground, no matter how small it is,” she said, while adding a cautionary note.

“Conversation is necessary, but the hope of having a global AI [framework] that works for everybody should not be high.”

China’s third plenum sees Communist Party double down on economic, tech, military power

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3271317/chinas-third-plenum-sees-communist-party-double-down-economic-tech-military-power?utm_source=rss_feed

China will focus on boosting its economic, technological and defence capabilities to tackle growing conflicts with the US-led West, the full text of decisions from a key party conclave has revealed.

The more than 22,000-word resolution document lists a wide range of measures for the next five years approved by the Central Committee of the ruling Communist Party, which met for its key third plenum last week.

The measures aim to strengthen China’s economic resilience, deepen the tech talent pool and narrow the rural-urban gap as part of efforts to find new growth engines and address demographic challenges, according to the document released by state news agency Xinhua on Sunday.

National security also gets greater prominence, with pledges to keep key industrial chains safe and boost strategic military deterrence.

The goals have to be accomplished by 2029, the 80th anniversary of the People’s Republic. The coming five years will also be a decisive period for the party’s target of building a modern socialist China by 2035, giving it a strong position in the great power rivalry with the United States and other geopolitical hostilities.

President Xi Jinping said the measures aimed to meet China’s “urgent need” to counter major risks and challenges, according to a separate Xinhua article on decisions made at the plenum.

Xi, who leads the Central Committee, said China was faced with “increasing uncertainties and unpredictable factors” impacting national development, as “external suppression and containment are continuously escalating”.

The four-day, closed-door plenary session of the Central Committee concluded on Thursday.

A unified set of market rules, fair and consistent regulatory framework, removal of restrictions to market entry and competition are among the aims listed in the resolution document, which also calls for efficient and coordinated policy implementation and pledges to address the financing difficulties of local governments.

It includes a promise to equally protect the “property rights of all types of ownership economies”, and to support the private sector.

The leadership also aims to promote the development of future industries, “new fields and new competitive tracks” in the global tech race.

The boost for tech and the private sector – the backbone of job creation and innovation – comes as China’s post-Covid economic recovery remains patchy. Growth momentum slowed in the second quarter, and public sentiment remains weak amid a prolonged property market slump, lacklustre financial markets and rising unemployment.

In manufacturing, China is under pressure from a global supply chain diversification away from its market and tightened hi-tech restrictions led by the US. Trade tensions with the European Union have also escalated, with exports of electric vehicles and some new energy products in limbo.

The difficulties have pushed Beijing to strengthen the resilience and security of its supply chains, including a mission to build up a “strategic hinterland” as backup for key industries and improve the national reserve system for key resources.

According to the document, the party also called to “step up building a self-controlled industrial and supply chain” with a focus on integrated chips, industrial master machines, medical equipment and advanced materials.

Xie Maosong, a senior researcher at Tsinghua University’s National Institute of Strategic Studies, said the fact that almost all of the long document was devoted to domestic issues indicated the leadership’s focus on stability and the push for progress.

He said the message was clear, that the only way China could cope better was by making itself stronger and be more prepared to tackle challenges on all fronts, he said.

“The message from the top leadership is consistent: we should prioritise our own matters first,” Xie said.

“But China’s door will remain wide open. It will continue to push for trade, investment and innovation links with the more friendly parts of the world as the decision indicates.”

The document includes a pledge to implement “transparent, stable and predictable” policies, in an apparent attempt to restore China’s market allure for foreign investors. This group has raised concerns about tightened security control in China, as they come under pressure to adjust supply chains or China operations amid the US-led decoupling.

Beijing has also doubled down on national security and stepped up military reform efforts, at a time when maritime tensions threaten to become flashpoints in its tensions with the US and its regional allies.

“[We should] accelerate the development of strategic deterrence forces, and develop new domain and quality combat forces,” the document said, elaborating on aims to build up military power in five years.

The leadership has also vowed to further improve national security mechanisms, to counter “long-arm jurisdiction” and to better safeguard China’s maritime rights and interests.

A mainland-based political analyst, who requested anonymity, said Beijing will continue to launch sanctions and legislation to hit back at US sanctions and protect its core interests over the issue of Taiwan and the South China Sea.

On the science and tech front, the decisions from the plenum include a call to cultivate national “innovative capabilities” and encourage “high-level foreign science and engineering universities to cooperate in running schools in China”.

More open and effective talent recruitment and cultivation mechanisms are expected, with the party calling for better treatment for young scientists so that they can focus on research.

It has also pledged more funding for basic research and better allocation of funds for research projects – including giving scientists more decision-making power and greater control over the funds.

China and the Philippines reach deal in effort to stop clashes at fiercely disputed shoal

https://apnews.com/article/philippines-china-shoal-agreement-3450e06b61bbe6ef9cd5dd9e211f6f79FILE - A member of the Philippine Coast Guard holds flags during the arrival of Chinese naval training ship, Qi Jiguang, for a goodwill visit at Manila's port, Philippines, June 14, 2023. (AP Photo/Basilio Sepe, File)

2024-07-21T10:15:01Z

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — China and the Philippines reached a deal they hope will end confrontations at the most fiercely disputed shoal in the South China Sea, two Philippine officials said Sunday.

The Philippines occupies Second Thomas Shoal but China also claims it, and increasingly hostile clashes at sea have sparked fears of larger conflicts that could involve the United States.

The crucial deal was reached on Sunday, after a series of meetings between Philippine and Chinese diplomats in Manila and exchanges of diplomatic notes that aimed to establish a mutually acceptable arrangement at the shoal without conceding either side’s territorial claims. The Philippine officials, who have knowledge of the negotiations, confirmed the deal to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity ahead of a public announcement.

China has disputes with several governments over land and sea borders, many of them in the South China Sea, and the rare deal with the Philippines could spark hope that similar arrangements could be forged by Beijing with other rival countries to avoid clashes while thorny territorial issues remain unresolved. It remains to be seen, however, if the deal could be implemented successfully and how long it will last.

Chinese coast guard and other forces have used powerful water cannons and dangerous blocking maneuvers to prevent food and other supplies from reaching Filipino navy personnel at Manila’s outpost at the shoal.

The yearslong territorial standoff at the shoal has flared repeatedly since last year between Chinese coast guard, navy and suspected militia ships and Philippine coast guard-escorted navy boats transporting food, water and fresh navy and marine personnel to an outpost on a long-grounded and rusting warship, the BRP Sierra Madre.

In the worst confrontation, Chinese forces on motorboats repeatedly rammed and then boarded two Philippine navy boats on June 17 to prevent Filipino personnel from transferring food and other supplies including firearms to the ship outpost in the shallows of the shoal, according to the Philippine government.

After repeated ramming, the Chinese seized the Philippine navy boats and damaged them with machetes and improvised spears. They also seized seven M4 rifles, which were packed in cases, and other supplies. The violent faceoff wounded several Filipino navy personnel, including one who lost his thumb, in a chaotic skirmish that was captured in video and photos that were later made public by Philippine officials.

China and the Philippines blamed each other for the confrontation and each asserted their own sovereign rights over the shoal, which Filipinos call Ayungin and the Chinese call Ren’ai Jiao.

The United States and its key Asian and Western allies, including Japan and Australia, condemned the Chinese acts at the shoal and called for the rule of law and freedom of navigation to be upheld in the South China Sea, a key global trade route with rich fishing areas and undersea gas deposits.

In addition to China and the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan have been locked in separate but increasingly tense territorial disputes in the waterway, which is regarded as a potential flashpoint and a delicate fault line in the U.S.-China regional rivalry. The U.S. military has deployed navy ships and fighter jets for decades in what it calls freedom of navigation and overflight patrols, which China has opposed and regards as a threat to regional stability.

Washington has no territorial claims in the disputed waters but has repeatedly warned that it is obligated to defend the Philippines, its oldest treaty ally in Asia, if Filipino forces, ships and aircraft come under an armed attack, including in the South China Sea.

One of the two Philippine officials said the June 17 confrontation prompted Beijing and Manila to hasten on-and-off talks on an arrangement that would prevent confrontations at Second Thomas Shoal.

During final meetings in the last four days, two Chinese demands that had been key sticking points were removed from the draft deal.

China had previously said it would allow food, water and other basic supplies to be transported by the Philippines to its forces in the shoal if Manila agreed not to bring construction materials to fortify the crumbling ship, and to give China advance notice and the right to inspect the ships for those materials, the officials said.

The Philippines rejected those conditions, and the final deal did not include them.

JIM GOMEZ Gomez is The AP Chief Correspondent in the Philippines. twitter mailto

First Hong Kong e-commerce festival to help city brands expand into mainland China to be held

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/hong-kong-economy/article/3271298/first-hong-kong-e-commerce-festival-help-city-brands-expand-mainland-china-be-held?utm_source=rss_feed

Hong Kong is to hold its first e-commerce shopping festival next month to help city brands expand into mainland China, the city’s finance chief said on Sunday.

Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po highlighted in his official blog that there was “considerable room for growth” in the online retail market.

Chan pointed out that, although the city’s online retail sales increased by nearly 60 per cent to HK$32.5 billion (US$4.2 billion) between 2020 and 2023, it only accounted for 8 per cent of total retail sales in 2023.

“There is a considerable room for growth when compared to 28 per cent recorded on mainland in the same year,” he said.

Chan added he hoped the Hong Kong Shopping Festival, to be organised by the Trade Development Council on mainland e-commerce platforms, could help small and medium enterprises boost their profiles and learn more about the market operation across the border.

“It could help Hong Kong small and medium enterprises reach out to new customer segments and expand into the mainland market, injecting new momentum into their business … and further boost the reputation of Hong Kong brands, ” he said.

“Mainland consumers could also directly gain access to high quality and genuine products from Hong Kong.”

Chan highlighted that Hong Kong products and services were seen as high quality and efficient on the mainland and had strong brand value there and across the region.

The campaign will feature more than 230 city brands, including clothing, cosmetics, household goods, food and drink, digital and health products, with special deals on offer.

The Trade Development Council will advertise the products on major social media and e-commerce platforms to help drive visitor traffic and invite about 20 major influencers to broadcast live stream promotions.

Chan added that authorities had also introduced a variety of measures to help small and medium enterprises tap into the huge e-commerce market.

The government last week launched the “E-commerce Easy” project, designed to provide small and medium enterprises with a maximum of HK$1 million to set up online stores, advertise their products on third-party online sales platforms and develop mobile apps and online payment options.

The government also allocated HK$500 million to Cyberport, the city’s technological business park, in 2023 to help retail and catering businesses with digital transformation, including setting up electronic payment systems, online promotions and customer management.

More than 330 ready-to-use digital solutions are now available for businesses to choose from.

Hong Kong’s retail sales dropped 11.5 per cent year on year to HK$30.5 billion in May, after a 14.7 per cent fall in April.

The consecutive double-digit decrease was blamed on a continued trend towards consumers spending across the border.

City authorities have promoted the mega event economy and the concept of “tourism is everywhere”, suggested by Xia Baolong, Beijing’s key official on Hong Kong affairs, to treat every part of the city as a potential spot to attract visitors and boost consumption.

Beijing earlier also raised the duty-free shopping allowance for mainland Chinese tourists visiting Hong Kong and Macau to as much as HK$16,100 per trip and expanded the individual visit programme to a total of 59 cities.

China philosophy students trade grilled sausages, highbrow theories at street food stall

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/trending-china/article/3271136/china-philosophy-students-trade-grilled-sausages-highbrow-theories-street-food-stall?utm_source=rss_feed

Highly educated people in China who take on manual work often attract controversy because they are traditionally expected to pursue high-end professions.

A new twist was added to the debate when on July 17 a viral video emerged of a group of PhD students from Sun Yat-sen University in Guangdong province, southern China, selling grilled sausages on the street.

The nine-member sausage-selling team includes PhD and graduate students majoring in philosophy.

After finishing a day of research work, they take turns selling their wares on streets near the campus at night.

They set up a gas canister and sausage grill on a modified electric motorbike, with a sign that reads: “Welcome to buy delicious sausages and engage in philosophical academic exchanges with us.”

Ziheng, a 28-year-old philosophy PhD student, initiated the sausage side business.

He told Yangtse Evening Post: “We are all engaged in philosophical research and hope to use sausages as a medium to have intellectual exchanges with customers, and become good friends with them.”

The high-achieving students aim to turn their sausage-selling gig into a Socratic-style street dialogue, encouraging casual and flexible discussions on interesting philosophical topics.

For every sausage sold, they will answer a customer’s philosophical question, discuss social issues, academic theories or simply share personal anecdotes.

Pangda, one of the team members, is a philosophy graduate. He is working to tutor students preparing for their graduate entrance exam.

He said the members are all busy writing papers and teaching during the day, engaging in mental labour. Selling sausages after work offers them a chance for physical activity and helps relieve academic anxiety.

“For students who are usually confined to their studies on campus, selling sausages on the street allows us to meet a variety of people, serving as a unique way to connect with society,” he said.

Pangda also said he has grown to love selling sausages and wants to continue doing it.

“High income does not necessarily bring happiness. Young people should have passion. Even small tasks can bring great joy.”

The sausages cost between three and five yuan (70 US cents) for two. Ziheng said they earn 100 to 200 yuan (US$28) a day, working from 10pm to midnight.

The group’s story has attracted widespread attention online.

“This group of students deserves praise for their courage! They are willing to humble themselves and experience another side of life,” one person said on Weibo.

Others took a different view, with one saying: “This is a waste of educational resources. They could have used their time to make a more meaningful contribution to society.”

Why China’s first giant HIP press marks a leap forward in aerospace goals

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3271300/why-chinas-first-giant-hip-press-marks-leap-forward-aerospace-goals?utm_source=rss_feed

China has released its first ultra-large hot isostatic pressing (HIP) machine, a milestone in the country’s development of high-performance materials for use in industries like aerospace.

The new equipment – called HIPEX1850 – was announced on Friday by the China Iron and Steel Research Institute. It will increase Beijing’s global competitiveness in the field of materials preparation, according to state media reports.

HIP is a manufacturing process which compresses materials using high “isostatic” gas pressure – or pressure applied from all directions – combined with ultra-high temperatures of up to 2,000 degrees Celsius (3,632 degrees Fahrenheit).

This process can reduce the porosity of metals and increase the density of ceramic materials, eliminating defects and increasing resistance to enable their use in an array of industries like aerospace, oil and gas operations, and manufacturing.

According to Qi Wen, project leader of the ultra-large HIP equipment at the institute’s affiliated company Gangyan Haopu Technology: “In simple terms, this equipment can make ordinary metals, ceramics and other materials stronger and capable of superior performance.”

“After undergoing the HIP process, the performance of the material will be greatly improved, and the fatigue life of the material can be increased by at least 10 times on average, which can meet the use requirements under extreme working conditions,” Qi told state broadcaster CCTV.

CCTV also hailed the feat as a milestone in China’s advancement in new material production.

China has doubled down on boosting advanced manufacturing and technological breakthroughs in areas such as new materials and semiconductors amid growing tech rivalry with the United States and its allies.

HIP technology “is an important means of preparing high-performance materials”, Gangyan Haopu chairman Lu Zhoujin told the Chinese version of nationalist tabloid Global Times.

The new ultra-large machinery will allow for the processing of larger and more complex materials.

The new machine is the largest in China and the second largest in the world, after the press owned by British company Bodycote and located in a US facility.

The technology was first created in the United States in the 1950s by researchers at the Battelle Memorial Institute in Ohio.

HIP is used on an array of materials including metals, ceramics and glass for use in aircraft, engine turbines, cutting tools, nuclear reactors, space shuttles, and more, according to Japanese manufacturer Kobe Steel.

Spacecraft require materials to be able to withstand high temperatures and pressure. Other industries like rail transport require materials with good wear resistance due to their high speeds.

HIP also plays a role in the oil and gas industry, which requires materials to have high corrosion resistance to withstand complex chemical environments, according to CCTV.

The technology differs from hot pressing, which also uses high temperature and gas to compress materials but does not use isostatic pressure.

Kobe Steel said that unlike hot pressing, HIP allows for materials to maintain a shape more similar to the original material.

China’s science ministry names and shames 10 for misconduct in research funding proposals

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3271296/chinas-science-ministry-names-and-shames-10-misconduct-research-funding-proposals?utm_source=rss_feed

In a rare move, China’s science ministry named and shamed 10 researchers for misconduct in applying for state research funds as Beijing doubles down on its push for tech prowess and self-reliance.

The Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) on Friday announced the details of five violations on its official website, including four cases of plagiarism in project proposals and one case in which researchers requested favourable review of their funding application.

The proposals involved were denied and the researchers were banned from taking part in state-funded research projects for up to seven years.

The denouncement came one day after the closing of the ruling Communist Party’s third plenum, where party leaders vowed to bolster a high-quality workforce to develop critical technologies.

Beijing views original innovation and tech self-reliance as pivotal to its footing in the global tech race and to break US-led containment. It has increased spending on scientific research and made efforts to address flaws in research and academics.

MOST unveiled a document in September 2020 to address violations in scientific and technological pursuits and publicly denounced researchers involved in nine cases of hiring ghost writers and fabricating project spending.

Chinese universities and research institutions regularly disclose academic misconduct, but it is rare for the top science regulator to reveal irregularities.

According to the ministry, Sun Beicheng, former vice-president of Nanjing Gulou Hospital, called and messaged reviewers to lobby them to approve his application for state funds for his research programme.

The four reviewers did not report Sun’s “calls for favour” to the regulator or request recusal. One of them, Zhao Yuanjin of China’s Southeast University, “assisted” in his request and later tipped Sun off that he was being investigated by the ministry, according to MOST.

The misconduct “severely disrupted” the application review process and “caused trouble for researchers who are dedicated to their work”, the ministry said, adding that it was “detrimental to the image of the scientific community and development of technological innovation”.

The ministry vowed “zero tolerance” for calls for favour in the funding application review process.

The ministry also reported four cases of plagiarism on applications in areas such as research methodology, innovative points and key indicators, which are crucial for appraisals for state funding.

MOST said it has summoned the people in charge at the research institutes and ordered them to strictly follow scientific research integrity guidelines and rectify their misconduct.

“Scientific integrity is the cornerstone of technological innovation,” the ministry said.

The ministry said it would “step up the supervision of academic dishonesty issues such as plagiarism, theft of intellectual property and fraud, and intensify the penalties for these violations”.

Badminton mocked as becoming ‘rich people’s sport’ in China as shuttlecock prices surge

https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3271124/badminton-mocked-becoming-rich-peoples-sport-china-shuttlecock-prices-surge?utm_source=rss_feed

A price increase in the cost of badminton shuttlecocks in China is reported to have been caused by an unlikely suspect – declining pork prices.

The price for one of the most popular models of shuttlecocks from Japanese brand Yonex – the AS02- sold for 149 yuan (US$20.5) for a pack of 12 on Friday, representing a 24 per cent increase from a month ago, according to a price tracking chart from Chinese e-commerce platform Taobao.

Major shuttlecock producers in China- including Yonex, Double Happiness, Lingmei and Victor Sport – have all issued announcements on price increases of 20 per cent or more in the past weeks, according to the Shanghai-based The Paper.

And most blamed “raw materials” for the price increases.

“The price of low-end feathers have tripled, and the price of mid- to high-end feathers have at least doubled,” Anhui province-based shuttlecock factory owner Li Yang said, according to the Shanghai-based Liberation Daily newspaper.

Li added that goose or duck feathers are usually used to make shuttlecocks.

Lower-end priced shuttlecocks, which cost around 2 yuan (28 US cents) each, remained the same over the last month, Taobao’s sales data showed.

Liu Zengjin, a researcher from the Institute of Agricultural Science and Technology Information, told the Liberation Daily last week that a possible change in the Chinese meat industry had contributed to the rising shuttlecock prices.

Liu said a fall in pork prices had led to higher demand for the meat, resulting in lower demand for duck and goose, meaning there are less feathers available for the production of shuttlecocks.

Pork prices in China fell by 2.7 per cent year on year in the first six months of 2024, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said earlier this month.

But the ministry has reported a slight rebound in prices in the past weeks, with pork in China averaging 28.9 yuan (US$3.98) per kilogram in the second week of July, representing a 1.2 per cent increase from the previous week and a 24.2 per cent increase from the same period last year.

The National Bureau of Statistics also said last week that the price of pork increased by 18.1 per cent in June year on year and by 11.4 per cent from May.

The trend has been noticed by Chinese badminton enthusiasts, who have started to complain on social media.

“Badminton has become an unaffordable sport for those earning a monthly salary of 20,000 yuan” has been a trending topic on Chinese social media platform Weibo for around two weeks.

The topic had been read by over 4 million users on the platform as of Friday.

“This has almost become like a rich people’s sport,” one user said on Weibo.

Badminton is one of the most widely played sports in China, with more than 30 per cent of young people considering it as one of their top three most played sports, the Shanghai-based iResearch Consulting Group said in 2022.

“The most direct impact is that the shuttlecocks at badminton clubs changed from the bigger brands like Yonex and Chaopai, to some second-tier brands or unknown brands,” said Beijing-based badminton coach Wei Zheng.

“This affects how I teach students because the quality control of these cheaper shuttlecocks are not as good or coherent, so it affects how they play when they are beginners.

“Also, this price hike ultimately adds to the cost of our coaching and how much we charge.”

Will Nepal’s new coalition government tip the scales of the India-China rivalry?

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3271132/will-nepals-new-coalition-government-tip-scales-india-china-rivalry?utm_source=rss_feed

Nepal will continue its delicate balancing act between India and China, according to observers, after political manoeuvrings saw a new government coalition formed and a new prime minister sworn in this week.

The changes see a parliamentary shift away from the previous communist-dominated rule after the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) left its alliance with the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) and instead formed a coalition with the centrist, New Delhi-leaning Nepali Congress – previously the country’s largest opposition party.

As the new coalition now holds the balance of power, the move meant a change of leader. So Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Oli of the UML took his oath of office on Monday – the fourth time he has served in the position – replacing predecessor Pushpa Kamal Dahal, head of the Maoists.

While there is no bad blood between the two communist parties that previously formed government, for Nepal’s neighbours, it means a shift from a Nepali government that was pro-Beijing to one that hold a mixture of allegiances between Beijing and Delhi.

However according to observers, that shift is unlikely to fundamentally change the status quo, as Kathmandu has economic and security dependencies on both of the Asian powerhouses.

Professor Lin Minwang, deputy director of the Centre for South Asian Studies at Shanghai’s Fudan University, said Nepal’s foreign policy is one of “pragmatism”.

“In fact, no matter who becomes Nepal’s prime minister, Kathmandu’s policy towards China and India is very unlikely to change. All these politicians are getting more and more shrewd and pragmatic,” Lin said.

“Nepalese diplomacy in the past has always been a balance between China and India, which is one of its basic lines. There might be slight differences between India-leaning or China-leaning in different governments, but they would definitely not offend the other one just because they are more friendly to one country.”

He added that Nepal’s constantly moving political landscape, with its frequent leadership changes, also makes it difficult to nurture any significant policy changes.

“This round of political change in Nepal is quite normal. Nepal hasn’t seen a full-term government for a long time,” he said. “Currently, Nepalese politicians have become less concerned with promoting their ideologies and more concerned over their party’s interests.”

In the past 16 years, Nepal has seen 14 such power shifts. Oli has been prime minister four times in 10 years; Dahal was prime minister three times.

Dr Amit Ranjan, a research fellow with the National University of Singapore’s Institute of South Asian Studies, said that while Nepal cannot afford to cross swords with either country, Kathmandu’s pro-China and pro-India governance is “interesting to watch”.

“[The Nepali Congress] is considered to be pro-India and Oli is considered to be pro-China. So it will be interesting to see how they are moving,” Ranjan said.

The landlocked South Asian country has long been considered by Delhi as falling within India’s sphere of influence. India borders Nepal on three sides and Kathmandu is heavily dependent on Delhi in terms of trade and energy supply.

India was also a key player in helping to end the Nepalese Civil War, which ran from 1996 to 2006 after Dahal’s Maoists attempted to overthrow the Nepali monarchy. It was Delhi that helped strike a peace deal that saw the country successfully integrate communist parties into its political system.

Ranjan said that, historically, Nepal was more dependent on India, with long-held close ties that China cannot compete with.

That said, when Oli served his first term as prime minister in 2015, he angered Delhi over a new constitution that split the country into seven states, resulting in protests by the Madhesi group, mostly of Indian origin, who said they were not getting enough territory. As a result, India imposed an economic blockade on Nepal, stopping medicine and other supplies getting into the country.

Known as a friend of China, Oli also expressed Nepal’s willingness to cooperate with Beijing under the Belt and Road Initiative, a global infrastructure project that Delhi has been critical of.

While Nepal joined the initiative in 2017, there have not been any belt and road projects started as Kathmandu has yet to sign the implementation agreement with Beijing. The possibility of Oli signing the plan is Delhi’s main worry, according to The Times of India.

But Ranjan doubted that Oli would make any aggressive moves given his new alliance with the India-leaning Nepali Congress.

“This is an unnatural alliance, as the two parties are completely different. They’re polar opposites. They are not ideologically or politically aligned; they have fought against each other. So it’s very difficult to manage,” he said.

Under the former government and the China-leaning Dahal, there were significant moves to align Nepal with China, with both Dahal and his foreign minister visiting Beijing.

According to Ranjan, while there was no problem with such actions under the previous alliance of two communist parties which share the same ideologies, under the new coalition with the Nepali Congress, those days are now over.

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Indonesian pageant embodies Chinese community’s hopes of wider acceptance under Prabowo

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/lifestyle-culture/article/3271174/indonesian-pageant-embodies-chinese-communitys-hopes-wider-acceptance-under-prabowo?utm_source=rss_feed

Pageants are often associated with glamour, but for a segment of the Chinese community in Indonesia, they represent a gateway to wider acceptance in the predominantly Muslim country.

An increasingly popular event in East Java province exemplifies the growing societal integration of Chinese Indonesians and their hopes for the future under President-elect Prabowo Subianto’s administration.

On July 14, East Java’s Chinese-Indonesian community turned out in their best Peranakan attire for this year’s final of Koko and Cici – “Mister and Miss” in Hokkien – held in downtown Surabaya, the province’s capital.

Angie Laurentsia, the East Java Koci Foundation chairwoman, said: “This year’s pageant marks its fourth year running. We have gone from strength to strength with each passing year.”

The contest is held annually in 10 of Indonesia’s 37 provinces, including East Java.

Emil Dardak, Deputy Governor of East Java, said: “I’ve come every year to the Koko Cici, and I’ve always been impressed by how far it’s come along.”

The event’s guest of honour, who was accompanied by his actress-wife Arumi Bachsin, said Koko Cici was a “celebration of Indonesia’s diversity” and a “reminder of the glue which binds all the ethnic groups” of the nation.

“The pageant is a testimony to the centuries of contributions of the Chinese community to our society,” Emil said.

Indonesia’s ethnic Chinese minority, estimated to make up between 1.7 and 3 per cent of the country’s population of 270 million, were oppressed under the rule of the former strongman president Suharto. From 1967 to 1998, Chinese-language schools were closed while Chinese cultural expressions and festive celebrations were banned.

After the Suharto era, Chinese Indonesians gained wider acceptance across society as official discrimination against the community ended. More Chinese Indonesians are now in politics and public service, while festive events such as the Lunar New Year are allowed to be held in the country.

Peranakan refers to the group of descendants of Chinese immigrants who have settled in the Malay Archipelago, including Indonesia, and intermarried with local populations over the centuries. Their culture is an amalgam of Chinese and local traditions with unique practices, cuisine, and language.

Emil cited the example of dishes synonymous with Indonesia, such as bakso (meatball soup) and lumpia (spring rolls), which have their origin in Peranakan culture.

“Indonesian-Chinese heritage has merged into the Indonesian identity so that the two are now indistinguishable from one another.”

The successful organisation of the Koko Cici pageant in recent years was proof of the local Chinese community’s seamless integration into Indonesia, Emil said. Chinese Indonesians can also be the bridge to connect their country to Chinese-speaking communities around the world, he added.

“I’ve no doubt events held by the Chinese diaspora here will have a positive impact on our relations with China and other Chinese-speaking countries.”

His comments came amid closer trade ties between Indonesia and China in recent years.

China is Indonesia’s No. 1 trading partner and second-largest source of foreign direct investment. In 2023, China’s exports to Indonesia totalled US$36.4 billion, while Indonesia’s shipments to the world’s second-largest economy were valued at US$66 billion. China has invested a total of US$30.2 billion in Indonesia over the five years to 2023.

Sherly Angelina, winner of the Cici East Java 2022 title and a contestant in this year’s Miss Indonesia pageant, said the event was timely to usher in a new era of hope for the Chinese-Indonesian community ahead of the inauguration of President-elect Prabowo in October.

“I feel certain our community will continue to make valuable contributions to the country, as we always have.”

For Sherly, the Koko Cici was a platform for her to promote the Chinese Indonesian community and make a positive impact on society through the event’s charity work.

After Prabowo won February’s presidential election, some Chinese Indonesians expressed wariness about him becoming the country’s leader given his alleged involvement in the country’s tragic May 1998 riots, which saw thousands of Chinese homes and businesses attacked and looted while more than a hundred Chinese women were also raped. More than 1,000 people were also killed in the violence.

Prabowo has maintained he was not responsible for the riots. However, he has admitted his involvement in the kidnapping of student democracy activists that same year, which resulted in the then-general’s dismissal from the military.

King Gaudi, an elder of Surabaya’s Chinese-Indonesian community, is optimistic of the community’s future under Prabowo.

“Prabowo, like all his predecessors, is no racialist against Chinese Indonesians. Not many in this country are racist,” he said.

The 81-year-old said the minority of Indonesians who were prejudiced against the Chinese tended to be more vocal than the tolerant but silent majority.

Hendri Wijaya, 24, who came in second at the 2024 Koko Cici, said he had been thinking of ways to play the role of an ambassador of Chinese-Indonesian culture.

“I want to make it my mission to re-familiarise young Chinese Indonesians with our ancestral traditions, many of which have been lost over time.”

Fellow contestant Michelle Princessilia Heru, 20, said the community had been gaining more online attention in recent years, particularly through Chinese-Indonesian influencers.

“We’ve seen quite a few ‘Chindo’ [slang word meaning Chinese-Indonesian] influencers and internet celebrities make their way on social media, and that’s a positive sign.”

Among the Chinese-Indonesian influencers who have a wide reach on social media are Evelyn Hutani, Steven Wongso and Indah G.

While these influencers typically discuss Peranakan traditions, they should ensure their content does not oversimplify the community’s rich history, according to Michelle.

Kevin Sugiantoro, secretary of IPTI (Indonesian Chinese Youth Association) East Java Chapter, expressed optimism about the community’s future under Prabowo.

Calling on Chinese Indonesians to look ahead to the future, Sugiantoro said: “What is important is how we can make ourselves good and contributing members of Indonesian society. I urge all young Chinese Indonesians to make this a priority.”

King Gaudi also echoed the call for Chinese Indonesians to serve the wider community in the country. The retiree runs the Medayu Agung Library in Surabaya, a privately run institution dedicated to preserving books and manuscripts on Indonesia’s Peranakan history.

“It’s important to pass on the history to the younger generations lest they forget.”

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South China Sea: Philippines says to solely run Second Thomas Shoal resupply missions

https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/southeast-asia/article/3271295/south-china-sea-philippines-says-solely-run-second-thomas-shoal-resupply-missions?utm_source=rss_feed

Manila’s resupply missions to troops on a disputed South China Sea atoll would remain purely Philippine operations, the National Security Council said on Sunday, after Washington vowed to “do what is necessary” to support them.

The Second Thomas Shoal, which hosts a tiny Philippine garrison stationed on a deliberately beached old warship, has been a focus of escalating confrontations between Chinese and Philippine ships in recent months as Beijing steps up efforts to push its claims to the South China Sea.

A Filipino sailor lost a thumb on the latest June 17 clash when Chinese coastguard members wielding knives, sticks and an axe foiled a Philippine Navy attempt to resupply its troops.

“As far as the RORE [rotation and resupply mission] is concerned, we’re keeping it as a purely Philippine operation utilising Philippine ships, personnel and leadership,” National Security Council spokesman assistant director general Jonathan Malaya said.

“That may change depending on the guidance from top management but that’s the direction or policy at present.”

Malaya’s remarks came after White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the United States “will do what is necessary” to ensure the Philippines can continue to resupply its troops on the contested atoll.

“We will continue to support the Philippines and stand behind them as they take steps to be able to ensure that,” Sullivan said during the Aspen Security Forum conference in Colorado.

Malaya said the National Security Council appreciated the US offer and the Philippines would continue consultations as treaty allies.

Manila has a mutual defence pact with the United States which requires both parties to come to the other’s defence in case of an “armed attack” against vessels, aircraft, military and coastguard anywhere in the Pacific theatre, which Washington says includes the South China Sea.

Beijing claims almost the entirety of the South China Sea, brushing aside competing claims from several Southeast Asian nations including the Philippines and an international ruling that its stance has no legal basis.

Second Thomas Shoal lies about 200 kilometres (120 miles) from the western Philippine island of Palawan and more than 1,000 kilometres from China’s nearest major land mass, Hainan island.

Filipino soldiers stationed on the shoal live on the crumbling BRP Sierra Madre and require frequent resupplies for food, water and other necessities as well as transport for personnel rotations.

China deploys coastguard and other boats to patrol the waters around the shoal and has turned several reefs into artificial militarised islands.

China Good Samaritans - landslip hero, delivery mercy man, long-distance rubbish mission

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/environment/article/3270931/china-good-samaritans-landslip-hero-delivery-mercy-man-long-distance-rubbish-mission?utm_source=rss_feed

We all need a helping hand in life, and when it comes, it feels all the more welcome when the act of generosity is from a stranger.

Here, the Post rounds up the best Good Samaritan stories to come out of China recently.

Highway hero

A road maintenance worker sacrificed his vehicle and equipment, worth 140,000 yuan (US$19,300), to save 100 cars from a landslide.

Xiong Jinhua, who is in his 60s, was rescuing a broken-down car on a section of the Shanghai-Chengdu Expressway, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality, on July 11.

As he finished fixing the car, a nearby hillside gave way.

Xiong moved quickly to get the driver of the car he had just mended to speed away from the falling mud and rocks.

He then got out of his own car to warn oncoming cars, and as he did so his vehicle and equipment engulfed by the landslide.

Police said Xiong stopped more than 100 cars.

The vehicle and rescue equipment, which Xiong paid for out of his own pocket, were worth a total of 140,000 yuan (US$19,000). His company said they would compensate him for the losses.

Lifesaver

A delivery worker in Wuhan, Hubei province, central China voluntarily carries an automated external defibrillator (AED) on his back so that he can “save lives wherever he is”.

Zhao Bin, 32, started carrying the 2.5kg device on July 15, despite it leaving him with less space for delivery orders.

He said he was inspired after seeing a drowning person being saved by a passing nurse, and life-saving acts he witnessed during floods in his home province of Henan in north-central China in 2021.

A portable AED can save the life of someone who suffers a cardiac arrest.

Awareness about the device was raised in China following the sudden death of Taiwan actor Godfrey Gao in 2019 and that of 17-year-old Chinese badminton player, Zhang Zhijie, during a tournament in Indonesia recently.

Rubbish job

A Chinese travel vlogger with 430,000 followers on Douyin has become widely known after she went on a rubbish clearing mission during a trip to Tibet.

Wu Guyi, 32, is driving by herself from northern China’s Hebei province to Tibet, a journey that is expected to last 23.

She was seen picking up rubbish on grasslands as she traveled.

In one high-altitude grassland area in southwestern Sichuan province, Wu collected 15 large bags of rubbish all by herself, and suffered altitude sickness as a result.

Wu has called on tourists to stop littering.

Paralysed China boy tearfully tells stepmother to have new baby if he dies during surgery

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/article/3271106/paralysed-china-boy-tearfully-tells-stepmother-have-new-baby-if-he-dies-during-surgery?utm_source=rss_feed

A paralysed 12-old boy in China who was about to undergo major surgery and tearfully told his stepmother to have a baby just incase he did not make it through alive has moved people on mainland social media.

The boy, whose nickname is Hanhan, is from China’s southeastern Anhui province and he received a hip bone surgery at hospital in Shanghai in mid-July, Anhui TV reported.

An unspecified medical accident when he was six months old left Hanhan has been paralysed from the waist down.

“My mother, if I do not make it off the operating table, you shouldn’t be sad. You must have a child to protect your life well,” the boy said as he lay in a hospital bed before surgery.

His stepmother, surnamed Wang, told him: “That will not happen. You will definitely come out smoothly. I am waiting for you at the door.”

She later said in a video released on Douyin that when she heard what the boy said, she burst into tears.

“Even in this circumstance, the person he is most worried about is me. This touched me very much,” said Wang, adding: “I feel the great effort I have spent on him is worthwhile.”

Wang married the boy’s father nine years ago when he was divorced and had two children – Hanhan and his elder sister.

Her Douyin account, @Hanhanxiaoshuaige, which literally means Hanhan Little Handsome Boy in English, records the boy’s daily life, and has attracted more than 500,000 followers.

The boy is filial to his stepmother, even going as far as offering her the first bite of his food before he eats it.

Hanhan always has a smile on his face when he uses the little car he has to move around. One of his legs is about three centimetres longer than the other.

“I hope he can walk like other kids. This is the biggest wish of my life,” said Wang, adding that Hanhan made it through six hours of surgery and was recovering well.

The boy’s story has melted hearts online.

“I was moved to tears when he said ‘My mother’. Little Prince, please recover well,” one person said.

Fatal stabbing of Chinese doctor fuels calls for stronger laws to protect medical staff

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3271288/fatal-stabbing-chinese-doctor-fuels-calls-stronger-laws-protect-medical-staff?utm_source=rss_feed

A doctor in eastern China has died after being stabbed by a man reported to be the relative of a patient, igniting public anger and fuelling calls for stronger punishment for violence targeting medical staff.

The fatal stabbing was the latest in a string of attacks on medical workers in recent years – a trend that reflects shortcomings in China’s medical system and tensions fuelled by a lack of medical resources.

Li Sheng, a cardiologist from the First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University, was stabbed on Friday afternoon while working in the outpatient clinic. He died later that night after emergency treatment failed, the hospital said in a statement on Saturday.

Local police said on Friday the attacker jumped from a building after stabbing Li and was still undergoing treatment. His identity and motives are not yet clear.

On Saturday night, the National Health Commission (NHC) expressed condolences over Li’s death and stressed that violence against medical staff is a serious crime.

“Such incidents not only harm the legal rights of medical staff but also sabotage the order of medical services and harm the rights of the public,” the NHC said in a statement. “We have zero tolerance for any kind of attack on medical staff.”

It said it was cooperating with police to crack down on similar crimes to ensure the safety of patients and medical staff and called for local hospitals to improve security.

According to the Economic Observer, Li had been working overtime on Friday and did not even have time to eat lunch.

A colleague told the newspaper Li was enthusiastic and always worked overtime to see as many patients as possible. The colleague watched a video of the attack that has been circulating online and identified the attacker as a former patient’s family member.

Li suffered multiple injuries, including to his liver, intestines, pancreas and abdominal aorta, the doctor said.

A Shenzhen-based doctor told the Post many hospitals do not have adequate security measures. She said that in her hospital, there were too many entryways, and not every entry is equipped with security checks. When emergencies happen, security guards usually cannot arrive in time, she said.

“In theory, there should be two paths into the clinic, and doctors can escape through the employee exit if anything happens,” she said.

But these measures cannot solve the problem at the root, she added.

Many have pointed to systemic flaws fuelling such sentiment against doctors. China’s public hospitals receive limited government funding and are required to keep medical fees low by policy.

With an urgent need to make profits to survive, doctors often face heavy duties and little pay. This has spurred corruption in some areas. Meanwhile, some patients feel they do not receive enough attention during treatment or cannot afford the large bills and blame it on doctors.

According to a 2020 analysis by Renmin University’s journalism school, there have been 295 media reports of attacks on medical staff over the past 10 years. In total, 362 people were injured in these attacks and 24 killed, and the attacker used a weapon in 99 of these incidents. The most common punishments reported were detentions and fines.

There is no specific law addressing such attacks against doctors. Attackers are typically charged with criminal offences including murder, intentional harm, or the catch-all crime of picking quarrels and provoking trouble.

In the wake of Li’s attack, many called for heavier legal safeguards, such as a separate law to protect the safety of medical professionals or a clause in the criminal law addressing such attacks with a matching punishment.

China’s pet economy being driven by elderly, singles dreaming of having cats and dogs

https://www.scmp.com/economy/economic-indicators/article/3271123/chinas-pet-economy-being-driven-elderly-singles-dreaming-having-cats-and-dogs?utm_source=rss_feed

Luo Aiping and He Yuqi, both single, white-collar workers in Guangzhou, have had new pets join their lives over the past couple years.

Luo, a lawyer in her 40s, got her first cat in 2021, and now she has four plus a dog.

She starts and ends every day by walking her dog, and having decided to give her pets more space, she even moved from the central business district to the suburbs, even though it means her commute takes over two hours.

He, a teacher in his 30s, has three dogs and a cat.

“I like to spend my social time rescuing small animals. Taking all my pets on a trip to the grasslands is my dream,” he said.

In 2023, China’s population fell for the second year in a row, while the number of cats and dogs owned as pets increased by 1.1 and 6.8 per cent year on year, respectively, totalling over 120 million.

And despite the ongoing economic headwinds, China’s pet economy remains more prosperous compared to most other sectors.

According to the China Pet Industry Operation Status and Consumer Market Monitoring Report released by market consultancy iiMedia Research from 2023 to 2024, even though the growth rate halved from its peak of over 33.5 per cent in 2020, the scale of China’s pet economy is expected to reach 811.4 billion yuan (US$112 billion) by 2025, up from 592.8 billion yuan in 2023 and 295.3 billion in 2020.

And with changes in China’s demographic structure, the ageing and single population have become the primary consumers in China’s pet economy, driving the rapid growth of demand for pet companionship, said Jack Bian, founder of ShiTa, a network platform covering the pet industry chain including breeding, food, supplies, travel, beauty, medical care and entertainment.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, single-person households accounted for 16.77 per cent of all households in China last year.

And while there is still a significant gap compared to 70 per cent in the United States and 46 per cent in Europe, the penetration rate of households owning pets in China is rapidly increasing, having reached around 22 per cent by 2023, the iiMedia report said.

According to the 2024 Pet Industry Insight Report released by Chinese Instagram-like social media platform Xiaohongshu, young people under the age of 29 living in first- and second-tier cities are gradually becoming the mainstream group of pet owners.

The report stated that young people’s concept of raising their pets has shifted to treating them as family members, even popularising the concept of “treating pets as well as treating themselves”.

Around 56 per cent of pet owners have changed their lifestyles for their pets, and 88 per cent said their spending had significantly increased or remained the same compared to the previous year, as young people are willing to spend generously, hoping to provide new experiences for their pets.

The Xiaohongshu report said that “having both cats and dogs” was the hottest topic of discussion among pet owners online, with over 460 million related posts on the social media platform.

“Having a single pet is a reality; having both cats and dogs at a young age is a dream life,” the Xiaohongshu report said.

Millennials born between 1980-95 and Generation Z born between 1995-2010 see pets as companions and family members, driving continuous consumption upgrades and the emergence of new professions in the industry, such as traditional Chinese medicine herbalists, pet detectives and animal psychological consultants, Bian said.

His platform provides high-end medical products like stem cell treatment, psychological counselling, insurance and travel photography services for pets, reaching over 1 million pet owners nationwide and involving hundreds of pet-related start-ups.

“I prioritise my pets over my social life and would forgo gatherings with friends for them. Their health and happiness are very important to me,” Luo said,

“I spend over 1,000 yuan (US$138) each month on pet food and another more than 1,000 yuan on pet snacks and toys, and these purchases make me happy.

“To be precise, I enjoy the single life with pets.”

Pet psychological consultation, meanwhile, costs range from 100 yuan to 500 yuan per hour.

“My cat, adopted last year, is disabled. I think she has similar feelings of isolation and sadness as humans do. So I plan to pay a pet communicator to help me understand its emotions and make it happier,” said He.

And according to the iiMedia report, 82.4 per cent of Chinese consumers pay attention to pet product brands, with the process of domestic replacement also occurring in the pet economy, with owners’ preference for Chinese brands significantly rising.

According to Euromonitor, a market research database provider, in China’s mid-range dry pet food market costing between 60 yuan and 80 yuan per kilogram, among the top 10 brands in terms of market share, over half were domestic brands.

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Nato’s push to integrate 4 Asia-Pacific countries faces China and Ukraine war hurdles

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3271168/natos-push-integrate-4-asia-pacific-countries-faces-china-and-ukraine-war-hurdles?utm_source=rss_feed

The plan by the United States to “institutionalise” four Asia-Pacific countries within the Nato framework is likely to hinge on a raft of factors such as the course of the Russia-Ukraine war, China’s continued “aggression” and the coming US presidential election.

Observers also say the move is aimed at ensuring a future American administration cannot easily reverse the arrangement, which is motivated by growing disappointment with other existing US-led alliances such as the Quad.

Last Wednesday, US Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said in an interview with South Korean news agency Yonhap that the US wanted to “institutionalise” the four Indo-Pacific partners of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or Nato, as Washington refocuses its attention on the region.

The grouping of Japan, Australia, New Zealand and South Korea is commonly referred to as the IP4.

Derek Grossman, a senior defence analyst at the think tank Rand, said the institutionalisation of IP4-Nato cooperation would depend on the outcome of Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine, the level of “Chinese assertiveness” in Asia-Pacific, and the US presidential election in November

“If the war ends on Ukraine’s terms, then IP4 would probably have less salience going forward”, but if Russia were to defeat Ukraine or achieve even limited goals, the US and Nato would view IP4 “as part of maintaining what is left of the liberal rules-based international order”, Grossman said.

Whether China would continue to threaten Taiwan and other regional neighbours could be a key factor, Grossman said, noting that if US President Joe Biden were to be reelected, the IP4 was likely to be further institutionalised.

Campbell’s comments came after the IP4 leaders attended last week’s Nato summit for the third year in a row in Washington, during which they issued a joint statement to “strongly condemn the illicit military cooperation” between Russia and North Korea.

The event is widely seen as a big step undertaken by the 75-year-old military alliance of European and North American countries to forge closer ties with its Pacific partners over common security threats.

During his meeting with IP4 officials, Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said both sides must work even more closely together “to preserve peace and protect the rules-based international order”.

In the final communique approved by all its 32 members, Nato called China a “decisive enabler” of Russia’s war against Ukraine and accused Beijing of employing “coercive tactics and efforts to divide the bloc”.

The alliance also reaffirmed that the “Indo-Pacific is important for Nato and promised to continue deepening cooperation with its IP4 partners on shared security concerns involving China, Russia and North Korea”.

In response, China accused Nato of seeking security at the expense of others and told the bloc not to bring the same “chaos” to Asia.

Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul, said Nato-IP4 cooperation was starting to be institutionalised through regular meetings, coordinated policy statements, and agreements for increasing interoperability.

“US allies in Europe and Asia are looking to do more together because regional threats to international order are increasingly linked,” he added.

Stephen Nagy, professor of politics and international studies at Tokyo’s International Christian University, said the institutionalisation of IP4 into Nato was an attempt by the current US administration to “ensure that a Trump administration cannot walk back [on] this institutional cooperation”.

During Trump’s presidency from 2017 to 2021, his administration adopted isolationism and protectionism and demanded that Japan and South Korea pay more to cover the cost of maintaining American troops in their countries.

Conversely, the IP4 countries were interested in institutionalising cooperation with Nato as they understood through the Ukraine war that conflict in one part of the world cannot be divorced from potential clashes in other regions, Nagy said.

“Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand will continue to invest diplomatic and other resources into institutionalising the IP4 on their own,” Nagy said. Doing so could help create stronger cooperation among these countries in cybersecurity, disinformation, and emerging technology, he added.

On China’s response to the momentum towards Nato-IP4 institutionalisation, Nagy said Beijing was likely to strengthen cooperation with Russia, Iran, North Korea and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, especially in joint military training.

For instance, China and Belarus, which joined the SCO this month, conducted joint military drills last week in Belarus’ southwestern Brest, just 2.8km from the Polish border and 28km from Ukraine.

Institutionalising the IP4 did not mean an “alliance” between the four countries and Nato as the US-Europe bloc was geographically limited by its charter including confining involvement in a conflict on the European continent, Nagy said.

“This means that there is no Indo-Pacific Nato or Asia-Pacific Nato forming, a warning that China often uses as disinformation,” Nagy said.

Geoffrey Miller, an international analyst with the Democracy Project hosted by New Zealand’s Victoria University of Wellington, said the IP4 was motivated and driven by a growing awareness of the limitations of Quad, an alliance comprising Australia, India, Japan and the US.

While Quad enjoyed “great attention” in the early months of the US administration, it had “quickly faded from view”, Miller said. Its progress was hindered by India’s competing priorities, such as the meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow last week, he added.

After the meeting, US Ambassador to India Eric Garcetti warned that India-US relations were still “not yet deep enough” to be taken for granted.

The closer IP4-Nato ties were also motivated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s security deal with the Solomon Islands, both in 2022, which “supercharged” already heightened US interest in the Indo-Pacific, Miller said.

“[They] also pushed the traditionally more independent-minded New Zealand and pacifist Japan to re-evaluate their positions,” Miller said, noting that the IP4 was invited to support Nato’s Strategic Concept, which pinpointed China as the alliance’s long-term adversary.

Approved in 2022, the concept reaffirms Nato’s key purpose is to ensure its collective defence based on a comprehensive focus in areas ranging from deterrence to crisis prevention.

Miller noted the IP4 was already “interwoven with Nato” through institutionalisation such as through the Individually Tailored Partnership Programmes (ITPPs). Nato’s ITPPs cover plans for comprehensive cooperation between the bloc and each IP4 country over four years.

In the case of New Zealand, the ITPP “studiously avoids any mention of China” due to the country’s “sensitivities towards its biggest trading partner”, Miller said.

Last year, New Zealand’s exports to the Greater China region – its largest market – totalled NZ$20 billion (US$12 billion) while its imports were valued at NZ$17 billion.

Nonetheless, the omission of China in any ITPP was unlikely to prevent a robust response from Beijing, Miller said.

“As cooperation between the IP4 and Nato becomes more concrete, more enduring and more clearly aimed at China, New Zealand and the other IP4 countries will be more likely to feel the sharp end of China’s response,” Miller said.

Ian Hall, international relations professor at Australia’s Griffith University, said Campbell’s suggestion was not surprising as Washington has been pushing for closer cooperation with its allies for some time.

However, the goal towards institutionalisation may only translate into regular meetings between Nato and the IP4 to discuss China and other issues of common concern, Hall said.

“I don’t expect it would involve much more than that.”

What do you get when you cross Chinese AI with comedy?

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3271254/what-do-you-get-when-you-cross-chinese-ai-comedy?utm_source=rss_feed

For all the things artificial intelligence can do, one area where it has consistently struggled is with cracking jokes.

But a team of Chinese scientists is trying to solve the problem in collaboration with their international peers, developing a model that can crack its own jokes and comment on images it encounters in the way many internet users do.

Which may highlight the basic problem they face: that humour is entirely subjective, depends on context and cultural factors and is notoriously hard to translate.

But while admitting “the humour generated here may hit differently for everyone”, the researchers from Sun Yat-sen University in southern China, with collaborators from Singapore Management University and Harvard University are hoping to one day create a model that can boost creativity.

In a survey of 154 internet users, the AI’s jokes in English, Japanese and Mandarin Chinese were judged funnier than comparable models such as LLaVA-1.5 by Microsoft Research and GPT-4v by OpenAI.

“What a baby might be thinking when lifted up high?”

“Now I have the urge to pee.”

And when shown the poster for the movie Forrest Gump, the model’s response was: “Sorry, the spot is taken.”

The problem with trying to use AI to generate humour is that traditional large language models employ a logic-based chain-of-thought (CoT) reasoning, which is effective for mathematical or scientific tasks but struggles with creativity.

Researchers addressed this by developing a “Leap-of-Thought” (LoT) capability, which fosters innovation by linking disparate concepts and making intellectual jumps.

“[The idea is] thinking outside the box, which bridges disparate ideas and facilitates conceptual leaps. Embracing LLMs with a strong LoT ability can unlock significant potential for innovation, contributing to advancements in creative applications,” the researchers said in a paper first presented at last year’s CVPR, a conference in computer vision and pattern recognition.

A revised version was uploaded to the open-access archive website ArXiv this April.

The team drew inspiration from the whimsical and imaginative Japanese game Oogiri, where players are challenged to come up with creative and humorous responses to pictures.

The team created a data set named Oogiri-GO, which contains over 130,000 samples in Chinese, Japanese and English, featuring humorous responses sourced from the internet.

By using a method called Associable Instruction Tuning and the model’s self-refinement, the researchers trained Alibaba’s Qwen model, endowing it with human-like leap-of-thought thinking that allowed it to respond to images and texts.

Alibaba is the parent company of the South China Morning Post.

For example, a picture of two brown dogs with a white one in the middle under a green blanket was captioned as “Matcha Oreo”; while a child and a dog apparently having a tearful argument was subtitled: “Is there another dog in your life?!”

The research team believes the model could go on to develop smarter, more entertaining interactive content, such as automatically generating humorous sketches or writing creative scripts.

“To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to profoundly explore the Leap-of-Thought capability in multimodal large language models,” the paper said.

The team hopes this research could signify a further blurring of the boundaries between humans and AI, saying: “The LoT ability serves as a cornerstone for creative exploration and discovery in LLMs.”

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The Myers-Briggs test is wildly popular in China. Is it a threat to labour rights?

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3271251/myers-briggs-test-wildly-popular-china-it-threat-labour-rights?utm_source=rss_feed

When looking at a list of requirements for a part-time job in southern China, Shanghai woman Yu Yulin found one sentence in bold: “A preference for ENFP.”

The acronym refers to a personality type on a popular test, the MBTI, and indicates the person is extroverted, intuitive, spontaneous and trusts their own feelings.

“I happened to be an ENFP, so I applied for the job,” Yu said.

Yu said the interviewer told her the post required massive communication with different people, and “ENFP [types] can recharge through social interactions, as opposed to the introverted, who are exhausted after all these social activities”.

For Yu, the screening made sense but she concedes that was, in part, because she matched with the criteria and did not feel the pain of an introvert having to lie to stay in the running for the job.

In recent years the MBTI test, or the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, has become popular among young people.

The test, a self-report questionnaire that claims to indicate differing personality types, produces 16 possible types that embody traits such as “introvert”, “intuitive” or “judging”.

The test was introduced by two Americans in a book in 1944. Over the years, critics have dismissed it as not having any scientific basis and being, basically, in the same league as a horoscope.

However, there are many who follow it as gospel, using it as a framework for building relationships or to screen people for certain roles.

The popularity of the tests may have become a problem in today’s China, according to a new study published in the July issue of the China Youth Study, a monthly official magazine that discusses issues that young people face.

The study, titled, “Introverted or extroverted? An analysis and reflection of the MBTI phenomenon”, called for young people to not consider the test the only way to get to know others, and for companies to avoid using it as a deciding factor when recruiting.

Researchers of the study said that while the test might have some psychological basis, some young people were blindly believing it, almost like a superstition.

“The test itself is limited. It assigns binary values to people’s personalities – people are either introvert or extroverts – and that doesn’t match the real world’s complex situations,” they wrote.

Scientists have offered an explanation into why people feel drawn to MBTI.

“Even though it’s labelled as ‘scientific’, it’s actually no different than reading your horoscope or blood type,” Chen Zhengxin, a psychiatrist at the Zhejiang Litongde Hospital, told Zhejiang Daily.

“It uses the Barnum effect – gives vague explanations. When you find that one or two descriptions suit you, you will subconsciously think all descriptions are perfect for you, even though there’s usually no connection between the different descriptions.”

But the criticism does not stop young people being obsessed. On popular social media platforms such as Xiaohongshu, posts that discuss MBTI are liked by hundreds of thousands of users.

Some posts even take it a step further, applying these personality types to different scenarios in the workplace and relationships.

“Which MBTI gets dumb after falling in love?” one post asked, declaring that the INFJ – people who are introverted, intuitive, trust their feelings and judgment – become smarter in relationships and learn from them, while the ISFP cannot forget their exes.

“This reflects that young people yearn to get to know themselves, as well as seek a sense of belonging and recognition,” the Chinese study said. “Meanwhile, there’s the objective need for them to release negative emotions and pressure.”

However, it is an entirely different matter for companies to use these tests to screen out possible candidates.

According to China’s labour laws, everyone enjoys equal rights to employment and companies cannot set obstacles to restrict candidates, unless they can prove that the tests are relevant to the requirements of the job in some way, lawyer Wang Yuqi told Workers’ Daily.

Furthermore, the tests used by many companies might not be accurate, Yu said. While in college, she had taken a course on organisational behaviour, where she had gone through two hours of psychological evaluations and analysis.

“But the tests on free websites nowadays don’t offer questionnaires that are as complex and complete, so I don’t trust unprofessional MBTI test results,” she said.

It was almost guaranteed the tests were not 100 per cent accurate, even if they were useful, Zhong Lianghong, a Hunan-based psychologist, said.

“Any sort of test can only serve as a reference, right?” Zhong said.

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Donald Trump says China’s Xi Jinping wrote him a ‘beautiful note’ after assassination attempt

https://www.scmp.com/news/world/united-states-canada/article/3271278/donald-trump-mocks-democrats-first-campaign-rally-after-assassination-attempt?utm_source=rss_feed

Former US President Donald Trump said on Saturday that Chinese President Xi Jinping wrote him a note after the Republican presidential nominee suffered a gunshot wound to his ear during an assassination attempt last week.

“[Xi] wrote me a beautiful note the other day when he heard about what happened,” Trump told a crowd in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in his first campaign rally since narrowly escaping the July 13 assassination attempt.

Trump mentioned Xi’s letter while discussing his economic policy toward China during his presidency, adding: “I got along very well with President Xi.”

The former US president also referenced messages from other world leaders following the shooting at a rally in Pennsylvania.

Trump, who called for national unity in a speech on Thursday as he accepted his party’s presidential nomination at the Republican National Convention, made no mention of that in his remarks before a raucous crowd on Saturday.

He frequently mocked Democratic US President Joe Biden as feeble. He derided senior Democrats, including Pelosi, for trying to persuade Biden to end his re-election bid.

Referring to Pelosi, Trump said: “She’s turned on him like a dog. She’s as crazy as a bed bug.”

The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Trump comparing Pelosi to a dog.

Fresh from his nominating convention where his takeover of the Republican Party was cemented, Trump appeared in Grand Rapids with his new vice-presidential pick, Senator J.D. Vance from Ohio. They took the stage in their first campaign event together with the Republican Party unified behind them.

In contrast, it is no longer certain that US President Joe Biden will be the Democratic Party’s nominee facing Trump in the November 5 election.

Biden has faced calls from some senior Democrats to end his re-election bid after his poor debate performance last month raised concerns over whether he could beat Trump or complete another four-year term.

Trump attacked Democrats, saying they wanted to kick Biden off the ticket after he won their presidential nominating contest.

“They have a couple of problems. No 1, they have no idea who their candidate is,” Trump said to laughter and jeers. “This guy goes and he gets the votes and now they want to take it away.”

“As you’re seeing, the Democrat Party is not the party of democracy. They’re really the enemies of democracy.”

He added: “And they keep saying, ‘He’s a threat to democracy.’ I’m saying, ‘What the hell did I do for democracy?’

“Last week, I took a bullet for democracy.”

Trump referred to the assassination attempt several times on Saturday. “I hope I don’t have to go through that again. It was so horrible,” Trump said.

Opinion polls show a tight race between the Trump and Biden at a national level but Biden trailing Trump in the battleground states that are likely to determine the winner. Many Democrats fear he may not have a realistic path to victory and that the party needs a new candidate to take on Trump.

There was a heavy police presence at Trump’s rally in Grand Rapids on Saturday, with police on every street corner for several blocks. US Secret Service officers were positioned on the top balconies in the Van Andel Arena, giving them a bird’s-eye view of the crowd inside.

Bag searches for those entering the indoor arena earlier in the day were long and thorough, and the Secret Service sweep of the building took about an hour longer than usual.

The rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last weekend was outdoors. At that event, the gunman was able to scale the roof of a building outside the Secret Service perimeter before opening fire on Trump, clipping his ear, killing a rally-goer and wounding several others.

The Secret Service, which is responsible for protecting Trump, declined to comment on security for the Grand Rapids event. An investigation is under way into the security failures at the Butler rally.

Trump gave a detailed account of his narrow brush with death in his convention speech on Thursday, telling the audience that he was only talking to them “by the grace of Almighty God”.

Trump’s former doctor, Ronny Jackson, said on Saturday that the former president is recovering as expected from the gunshot wound to his right ear, but noted intermittent bleeding and said Trump may require a hearing exam.

The bullet fired by the would-be assassin at the July 13 rally in Pennsylvania came “less than a quarter of an inch from entering his head,” said Jackson, a Republican congressman from Texas who had served as doctor to US Presidents Trump and Barack Obama.

‘He saved me and the show’, skilled China doctor fishes bone from throat of opera singer

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/trending-china/article/3270945/he-saved-me-and-show-skilled-china-doctor-fishes-bone-throat-opera-singer?utm_source=rss_feed

A French opera singer has thanked a doctor in China for removing a fish bone from one of the most important parts of his body, his throat.

The quick-acting medical man’s intervention in Shanghai has caused much comment and mirth on mainland social media.

Laurent Ban had been performing in Shanghai as one of the principal singers in the musical Mozart l’opéra Rock.

In mid-July a fish bone became lodged in his throat while he was eating river fish, a common dish in China.

Ban rushed to Ruijin Hospital in the city to seek emergency treatment, according to Shanghai TV.

There, junior doctor Chen Yongxuan at the hospital helped remove the offending bone.

“It’s a luxury to receive your help, doctor. I am the opera singer actor you saved yesterday with the fish bone in his throat,” Ban was quoted as saying.

“I would like to tell you that you saved me, of course, and also the show, because I was still able to sing in the show that same night.”

“You are great, very professional. Thank you so much.

“See you soon the next time when I go to Shanghai. We will invite you to our new show,” said Ban.

The 49-year-old French singer has become popular on social media in China.

He has visited the mainland many times over the past two decades since he first came to perform in 2005.

He is affectionately known as Lao Hang Ban, which means old flight in Mandarin, because the pronunciation of his French name sounds like that of these three Chinese characters.

Mozart l’opéra Rock will tour more than 10 mainland cities in the second half of this year.

Generally speaking, the removal of fish bones is seen a minor procedure in China’s hospitals because eating river fish, which have easy to swallow thin bones, is highly popular.

In most cases a simple pair of pincers will do the job but sometimes surgery is required.

Ban’s hospital experience provoked a lively discussion mainland social media.

“Why are only Chinese doctors good at retrieving fish bones? Because they do it a lot. It seems only Chinese people like to river fish while foreigners eat sea fish with big bones.

“Foreigners don’t know how to spit out fish bones while eating fish, haha,” said one person on Douyin.

“You can always trust Chinese doctors to remove fish bones. They do it so expertly!” said another.

‘Opening up is China’s greatest reform’: noted economist calls for new market standards

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/3271267/opening-chinas-greatest-reform-noted-economist-calls-new-market-standards?utm_source=rss_feed

China cannot replace external demand with the domestic, a noted Chinese economist has warned, while calling for “new standards” to fundamentally revive public confidence.

“External demand is particularly important for China since the country is not able to consume the excessive supply capacity on its own,” Wu Xiaoqiu, director of the National Institute of Financial Research at Renmin University, told a forum in Hong Kong on Saturday.

Calling on Beijing to further open up its markets, Wu said: “Don’t think China can rely on its own domestic consumption because its economy is growing bigger.

“Though internal demand is important, it cannot replace the external, which means [we need] not only an expansion in total demand but, more importantly, to provide new [market] standards.”

China’s market still does not fully operate in line with international standards in various areas, and must further deepen its integration with the global market, Wu told the forum.

“Many people underestimate the importance of external markets as they fail to recognise that opening up is crucial to China’s future; in fact, opening up is China’s greatest reform.”

The Chinese economy posted 5 per cent growth in the first six months this year, effectively driven by exports.

But some analysts have called on Beijing to rely more on the domestic market due to increasing trade friction with the West over its cheaper electric vehicles and alleged state-backed overcapacity.

Domestic demand in the world’s No 2 economy has seen extended sluggishness amid a downturn in the stock and property markets, youth joblessness and general anxiety about the future.

“The true problem with China’s economy is the low confidence and expectations of residents,” Wu told the forum hosted by the University of Hong Kong, titled “China’s Power and New Chapter of Global Economy: Development and Outlook”.

China’s imperfect legal system is the most significant factor hindering this confidence, he added.

“I am pleased to see that Beijing recognises the essence of China’s economic problems, particularly emphasising the role of the rule of law in the press release of the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee,” Wu said, referring to a key policy-setting conclave of the Communist Party leadership held last week.

Wu also criticised Chinese banks for asking residents about the source and direction of their funds when depositing or withdrawing money, calling it a “serious violation of people’s right to privacy”.

His comments, reported by Chinese media, went viral in China, where many are dissatisfied with what they see as the banks’ excessive intrusion into private details.

Wu also took aim at China’s three years of zero-Covid restrictions, saying they had “undermined the rule of law system”.

“I believe that it is the existence of a sound rule of law, combined with an institutional platform shaped under the principles of a modern market economy, that will be the source of China’s continued economic prosperity, rather than frequent policy adjustments,” he said.

Hong Kong patients want faster, cheaper treatments. Now they’re flocking to mainland China

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/society/article/3271269/hong-kong-patients-want-faster-cheaper-treatments-now-theyre-flocking-mainland-china?utm_source=rss_feed

Hong Kong retiree Donika Liu leaves her home in Tsuen Wan at 8am and starts a 90-minute train journey across the border to Shenzhen.

At the University of Hong Kong–Shenzhen Hospital in Futian, she sees a doctor and collects a month’s supply of a targeted therapy drug for her cancer.

She is done by noon, and then begins her journey home.

“I make these long, arduous trips across the border to get life-saving medication I cannot afford in Hong Kong,” 59-year-old Liu said.

Single and living alone, she quit her job in social services after she was diagnosed with lung cancer more than two years ago.

Then the cancer spread to her brain. She was told she needed a targeted drug which would cost more than HK$30,000 (US$3,800) a month in Hong Kong.

Unable to afford it, she went to mainland China, where the same medicine cost about 5,000 yuan (US$687) a month, less than a fifth of that in Hong Kong.

She said she had been making her monthly trips across the border since last September.

Liu is among thousands of Hong Kong residents seeking medical care on the mainland, where waiting times are shorter and consultations and medicines cost much less.

The trend has picked up since the reopening of the border last year after the Covid-19 pandemic, and includes not only low-income residents and the elderly, but more well-off Hong Kong residents too.

Experts said the trend was largely market-driven, but also reflected the state of Hong Kong’s overwhelmed public medical system, with its notoriously long waiting times, while private care was beyond the reach of most people.

They called for more support to those seeking medical services in the Greater Bay Area, which connects Hong Kong, Macau and nine cities in Guangdong province.

“It is an irreversible trend, driven by the integration of the Greater Bay Area and the improving medical services across the border,” said Dr Lam Ching-choi, a member of the city’s key decision-making Executive Council.

“The trend has created new opportunities for cooperation between Hong Kong and the mainland in medical care, and has also prompted us to consider how we can solve our own problems.”

Hong Kong’s rapidly ageing population has put increasing pressure on the public medical system. Hospital Authority data also shows that waiting times can even stretch into years.

A comparison of median waiting times across specialist outpatient clinics showed that a “stable case” eye patient booking a first appointment must wait between 42 and 85 weeks, as of the end of March. The longest wait of 180 weeks was recorded in Kowloon West.

Those considered urgent or semi-urgent cases had to wait less.

The median waiting time for ear, nose and throat appointments ranged between 14 and 70 weeks across clinics, and for orthopaedic and trauma cases, between 20 and 59 weeks.

Security guard Tan Chun, 70, went to a public hospital in February for chronic back pain caused by the narrowing of her spinal canal. She was told to wait three months for her next consultation, in May.

In March, the pain in her lower back was so severe that she could barely walk. She tried massage and acupuncture, but stopped when she could not afford to pay HK$500 to HK$600 each time.

A mainlander married to a Hongkonger, she made a five-hour journey by high-speed train to her hometown, Guangxi, for treatment at hospitals there.

She said she was attended to immediately and over several weeks, received treatment including drug infusions, massage, acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine.

“The waiting time in Hong Kong’s public hospitals is just too long to bear the pain,” she said.

Linda Tsang Chi-man, executive director of the Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions Greater Bay Area Social Services, said the number heading to the mainland, especially elderly people, had started surging from the second half of last year.

Many sought dental and eye care and physical check-ups in Shenzhen and Zhuhai, near the border.

Some were attracted by the mainland institutions’ increased advertising in Hong Kong, while others were encouraged by good feedback from friends or relatives about the quality, care and cost.

Tsang’s organisation decided to start guided tours taking elderly Hongkongers for health screenings and sightseeing across the border.

Patients’ rights advocate Tim Pang Hung-cheong, of the Society for Community Organisation, said that before the pandemic, most of those going across the border for medical services were low-income residents and new arrivals from the mainland.

Now, more middle-class patients are going too, including cancer patients who paid only a quarter to a third of Hong Kong prices for treatments such as chemotherapy, radiotherapy and targeted therapy drugs.

Most chose hospitals in Shenzhen, although some travelled further to Zhuhai, Zhongshan or Huizhou, also in Guangdong.

Pang said he expected the number to keep growing.

The University of Hong Kong–Shenzhen Hospital, which opened in 2012, is a top choice for many Hongkongers because it bears the brand of the city’s top university.

Until this year, the public hospital and its community health centre were the only mainland institutions where eligible elderly Hongkongers could use a healthcare voucher.

Since 2009, eligible residents aged 65 and above have received an annual voucher of HK$2,000 per person, with the amount allowed to accumulate up to HK$8,000.

The value of vouchers used at the hospital tripled from about HK$4 million in 2019 to about HK$11.9 million last year, according to official data. In the first half of this year, vouchers worth about HK$9.2 million were used.

In February, the Hong Kong government announced that the vouchers could also be used at seven more medical institutions in mainland cities in the bay area this year. Five offer integrated medical services and two provide dental care.

Other medical institutions on the mainland, including those targeting better-off patients, have also gained increasing popularity.

Retired construction foreman Kwong Yuk-lam, 72, said he and his wife accompanied their accountant daughter to the Shenzhen New Frontier United Family Hospital in Futian to remove her uterine fibroids.

Everything was done in just three days, he said.

His daughter, in her 40s, checked in on May 30 and had a check-up before undergoing the procedure the next day. She was discharged the day after that.

“The environment was good and more importantly, the arrangement of the services was fast,” Kwong said.

The total cost? About 40,000 yuan.

Kwong said if his daughter had chosen to be treated in Hong Kong, she would have had to wait half a year for a follow-up visit at a public hospital. Going to a private clinic would have cost about HK$130,000 – three times more than she paid in Shenzhen.

Brian Siu Ngai-fong, executive director of New Frontier, which runs the private hospital in Shenzhen, said that until last August, it saw only about 20 Hong Kong patients a month.

Anticipating the arrival of more Hong Kong patients after the pandemic, the hospital increased its advertising on social media and in patients’ groups last summer.

“The number of Hong Kong patients started growing last September and the momentum has stayed,” he said.

Targeting middle- and high-income patients, it now has about 1,000 patients a month from Hong Kong, accounting for a fifth of its total.

Many were elderly, and the most sought-after services included health screenings, dental cleaning and gastroscopy.

Physical check-ups cost between about 3,000 yuan and 8,000 yuan, and a gastroscopy cost between 7,000 yuan and 8,000 yuan, both roughly half the price in Hong Kong.

The hospital now runs a regular shuttle bus service from the Futian border, and has trained its medical staff to speak Cantonese and set up a dedicated hotline for Hong Kong and Macau patients.

Siu said the hospital would open a new rehabilitation centre in Hong Kong this year, so patients returning from Shenzhen could receive follow-up services.

Hongkonger Golan Kwok Che-lun started a volunteer service last year to accompany cancer patients to the University of Hong Kong–Shenzhen Hospital.

The former IT professional, now 60 and retired, was diagnosed with lung cancer three years ago while working in Shanghai. That was when he realised how much less targeted therapy drugs cost there.

For example, he said, a particular hormone therapy drug for prostate cancer costs about HK$35,000 a month at Hong Kong’s public hospitals but only 500 yuan on the mainland – less than 2 per cent of the price in Hong Kong.

“For many, heading north is not an alternative but their only way out,” he said.

Kwok and his team of six volunteers, all current or recovered cancer patients, have helped more than 100 patients so far. Some had impaired mobility or were unfamiliar with procedures on the mainland.

The team now makes a weekly trip, taking three to eight patients across the border. Although the process was mostly smooth-going, the long trip could be agonising for some elderly patients.

Sometimes, when their digital medical records were not accessible across the border, they ended up having to repeat tests there.

Kwok hoped to train more volunteers to meet growing demand.

Tsang Kin-ping, chairman of patient group Rare Disease Hong Kong said those seeking cheaper treatment on the mainland included people with rare diseases.

About eight patients with spinal muscular atrophy – a degenerative genetic condition that weakens the muscles progressively, causing mobility problems – began making regular trips to the University of Hong Kong–Shenzhen Hospital last year.

Tsang said each of them needed medicines that cost more than HK$2 million a year in Hong Kong without government subsidies. In Shenzhen, it cost 95 per cent less, 100,000 yuan a year, he added.

Kwok and Tsang urged Hong Kong authorities to do more to bring down the price of the drugs in the city.

Others said Hong Kong patients also faced difficulties accessing their digital medical records when on the mainland, and some did not know how to handle medical disputes there.

Some suggested expanding the healthcare voucher scheme further to include more Grade 3A hospitals, the top tier of hospitals on the mainland, in Guangdong cities.

It would also help if the government subsidised patients to buy the mainland’s medical insurance to cover inpatient service expenses, they said.

Lawmaker David Lam Tzit-yuen, who represents the medical and health services sector, said that when it came to drug prices, the mainland had strong bargaining power with pharmaceutical companies.

He suggested that the Hong Kong authorities work with the central government to buy costly drugs for rare diseases and cancers to bring down the prices in the city.

He said the authorities had acted to cut the long waiting time at the city’s public hospitals.

Community screening for earlier detection of chronic conditions had helped reduce the number of serious cases, while stable cases were moved to the primary healthcare system.

“We need to increase the manpower on the one hand, and also reduce the number of patients with serious diseases on the other, as well as hand some stable cases over to the community,” he said.

The government had set a series of targets to cut waiting times, including reducing the wait for stable new case bookings for the specialty of internal medicine by 20 per cent in 2023-24. That meant going from 122 weeks to 97 weeks

According to the Hospital Authority’s report on last year’s performance, the target had been reached, with the waiting time down to 92 weeks.

The authorities were also working to meet new targets to trim the waiting time for stable new case bookings for ear, nose and throat, and orthopaedics and trauma patients.

Exco member Lam Ching-choi said the trend of Hongkongers heading north reflected the city’s polarised medical system which left many sandwiched between affordable public care and high-priced private care.

He said cooperation between the city and the mainland could offer a solution, with patients doing low-risk tests on the mainland at a lower cost before returning to Hong Kong to consult local doctors.

Further cross-border healthcare integration would see more Hong Kong doctors seeking opportunities in the bay area, and different health conditions could be treated at various places in the region to maximise benefits to patients, he added.

Lau Siu-kai, a consultant for the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macau Studies, a semi-official think tank, said the trend of Hongkongers seeking medical care on the mainland could make up for the shortcomings of the city’s medical services and also prompt local doctors to lower prices.

But he cautioned that a continuous influx of patients could cause mainlanders to complain that Hongkongers were swamping their medical resources.

He said it would help if more Hong Kong businesses set up medical facilities across the border, increasing the overall supply of services for both Hongkongers and mainlanders.

He also urged the authorities on both sides to ensure cross-border medical disputes were handled properly and step up education on patient rights.

“This can promote the development of our healthcare industry and is also in line with the broader cross-border healthcare integration,” he said.

China’s fitness enthusiasts exercise caution as they look to make their yuan go a long way

https://www.scmp.com/business/china-business/article/3271139/chinas-fitness-enthusiasts-exercise-caution-they-look-make-their-yuan-go-long-way?utm_source=rss_feed

China’s economic slowdown has cascaded in to almost every aspect of daily life in the country. With consumers tightening their belts, even wellness has taken a hit.

As the country faces slower economic growth this year, many franchises and boutique gyms face an uncertain future in a sector that was already bruised by the lockdowns during the Covid-19 pandemic. Now, gymgoers in China are opting for flexible passes and short-term memberships amid a slowdown in the economy and a loss of trust in some brands.

Shanghai-based fitness coach Jay Dengle said he has noticed a shift in customers’ spending habits away from long-term memberships. He has also seen an uptick in customers using third-party platforms like ClassPass, which allows users to pop into a variety of studios without being a full-time member.

“A lot of people are just not spending like they used to,” said Dengle, co-founder of exeQute, a class-based fitness centre located in downtown Shanghai. “Before our most popular membership was a three-month membership. This month, we sold only one three-month membership, with the most popular being flexible credits on smaller packages.”

It comes as economic data released this week showed the world’s second largest economy growth momentum had weakened, while retail data came in well below expectations.

Still, China’s fitness market is expected to continue growing as consumers are paying increasing attention to health and fitness. New fitness models are emerging all the time, including group class boutique studios and private teaching studios. The fitness industry is expected to cross 100 billion yuan in 2026 (US$13.8 billion), compared with 70.6 billion in 2021, according to Statista.

Apps like ClassPass also offer competitive sales for price-conscious consumers, making the price per class even cheaper for users than going directly to the retailer.

“I thought customers were price-sensitive, but now I have realised that they are just not spending,” said Dengle, who believes the wave of shutdowns of prominent fitness franchises in China during the Covid-19 pandemic has weakened trust between consumers and fitness centres.

Tera Wellness, once a dominant player, shut down its operations in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou in May 2023 after declaring bankruptcy. At the time, several aggrieved trainers took to social media, claiming the company had failed to pay wages and rent, while customers were left fuming as their membership fees were not refunded.

Other franchises like SpaceCycle and Physical also shut down several branches across China in the past year, causing an uproar among consumers who had to forfeit their deposits.

Raphael Coelho, the managing partner at X-Sigma Partners, an accelerator focused on scaling up retail brands in fitness, pet care, and food and drink, said consumers in China are looking for community-oriented gyms.

“We saw this trend globally, of people wanting to go to boutique fitness studios,” said Coelho, and while China is going through a slower economic transition, only niche concepts with strong business strategy can survive.

“There may be a lot of reasons why a concept fails,” he said. “You can’t just blame it on the economy. “It may be the business model, or the structure may have always had a problem to begin with.”

A slow market means only the best businesses will thrive and grow, he added.

One of the rare successes in China’s wellness industry is MYBarre, which opened its first gym in Shanghai in 2016.

MYBarre gym is popular with women, as it incorporates ballet, full body workout, sculpting, toning, strengthening and flexibility.

Siri Nordhejm, co-founder of MYBarre, says they were lucky to make it through the pandemic, mainly because most of her customers were Shanghai residents and not foreigners, who left the city in droves during the pandemic.

Consumers are more price-conscious and looking for the best value for money, Nordhejm said. The shift in attitude forced Nordhejm and her business partners to rethink the way they offered memberships to customers.

“We don’t lock people in the system which, I think, is definitely the way to make consumers feel happy,” said Nordhejm. They can try it for the experience and do not have to opt for any long-term contracts, she added.

“If you really have a great product, a great experience, I don’t think people mind actually spending the money,” she said.

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Prefab paradise? How China-made homes could solve Australia’s housing crisis

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/economics/article/3271180/prefab-paradise-how-china-made-homes-could-solve-australias-housing-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed

While tourism, resources and education usually dominate trade between Asia and Australia, a surprising new trade has been flourishing under the radar in recent years – the booming business of prefabricated “prefab” housing and building materials.

Though the numbers may pale in comparison to the billions of dollars in two-way trade between the regions, Australian imports of prefab goods from Asia have been steadily climbing year over year.

Chinese prefab exports dominate the market, followed by those from Vietnam and Malaysia, mirroring patterns seen in broader construction material imports such as steel.

As Australia grapples with a housing affordability crisis, prefab housing has emerged as one potential solution to increase housing supply. Experts say imports of prefab components from Asia and elsewhere are likely to continue climbing to supplement locally-made materials.

This push towards prefab – assembling modular and stand-alone parts manufactured off-site into full homes – comes as the housing shortage has rocketed to the top of the national agenda. With the cost of living crisis as a backdrop, housing affordability has become a crucial issue ahead of next year’s elections.

“There’s no doubt that the electorate’s mind is focused on cost of living issues with housing at its root,” said Matthew Kandelaars, Property Council of Australia’s group executive on policy and advocacy. “More and more people are talking about prefab in an Australian context, given the significant national housing supply deficit that we’re facing.”

A strong trading relationship with China and other parts of Asia will remain crucial, given the pivotal role these markets play in Australia’s housing landscape. Experts note that foreign buyers from Asia – who are limited to purchasing new homes – provide vital impetus for the construction of additional housing stock, in addition to supplying essential building materials.

“As Australia’s domestic sector for prefab housing … [and supply chains] prove themselves up and scale up, then the natural position would be that we would look to import what we can,” Kandelaars said.

Over the past five years, Australia has imported nearly A$500 million (US$338 million) worth of prefab housing materials and modules from China alone, while imports from Malaysia and Vietnam each totalled around A$34 million.

Chinese goods made up roughly 70 per cent of Australia’s prefab imports last year – dwarfing the more modest 3 per cent shares from Malaysia and Vietnam, in distant second and third place.

This surge in Asian imports comes as the Australian government has set an ambitious target – signing a new national housing accord with state counterparts to build 1.2 million new homes between 2024 and 2029. National statistics show just over 900,000 dwellings were constructed nationally in the previous five-year period.

Kandelaars highlighted the scale of the challenge, citing a complex and bottlenecked housing system beset by rising taxes, high construction and land costs, and cumbersome development approval red tape. He said that while the “dream of a quarter-acre block that has been hard-wired into the Australian psyche for so long is changing”, the planning system hasn’t shifted as quickly.

But he said Australia had reached a tipping point, with lawmakers now accepting the reality that the country’s housing affordability woes are “intrinsically” linked to persistently low new home-supply levels.

The path to this point has not been without its challenges, however. Fingers have frequently been pointed at foreign buyers, particularly those from China, for allegedly jacking up housing demand and prices. Yet research has shown that foreign-buyer demand actually provides a crucial business case for new housing development, ultimately benefiting Australian residents.

As Australia has sought solutions, “smart building” groups like prefabAus, the country’s pre-eminent prefab industry body, noted that the new national housing accord and other manufacturing plans presented significant opportunities for the prefab sector to help deliver new homes.

Australia’s building ministers echoed this sentiment, earlier this year agreeing to cut red tape on construction codes to permit greater use of prefabricated and modular construction techniques.

Businesses are seizing these openings, with Damien Crough, founding director of prefabAus, reporting a surge in inquiries from prefab material suppliers in China, Vietnam, and Thailand seeking to join the association, alongside local prefab builders.

Private Australian developers and entrepreneurs also told This Week in Asia that they are exploring options to source materials, primarily from China and Vietnam, and invest in prefab development ventures.

One Australian entrepreneur based in Vietnam said he was in the process of securing Vietnamese-made materials, but acknowledged the high certification standards in Australia for housing made it challenging to import Asian-made products, even though manufacturing costs were lower and lead times faster in Asia.

Similarly, a Malaysian developer based in Sydney lamented that the prefab industry could have achieved much greater scale, beyond “just replacing holiday cabins in caravan parks”, were it not for the difficulty in meeting Australia’s stringent building and material standards.

Both individuals declined to be named, as they are working on commercially sensitive deals.

Aside from compliance issues with quality standards and building codes, Crough of prefabAus said there were concerns that materials imported from overseas, such as Asia, may not be properly inspected for quality or could be damaged in transit to Australia.

Indeed, it is not uncommon to see Ikea-style, click-together home kits being sold on Asian e-commerce platforms, with prospective buyers questioning their quality online.

To tackle these obstacles, builders like Bibo Build – which currently puts together bespoke prefab “Lego-style kits” known as packs and produces assembly blueprints for builders, but hopes to scale up to larger projects – have taken matters into their own hands. Bibo manufactures Chinese products locally and supervises the entire production process to ensure the materials comply with Australian standards before being shipped.

Bibo founder Lina He told This Week in Asia there was “resistance” to prefab products from overseas, including Asia.

“With [so] many made-in-Australia campaigns, it doesn’t really help, but on the other hand, there is a genuine lack of [affordable] solutions,” He said. “So, some people are more practical about it.”

According to He, making prefab “packs” remains cost-prohibitive within Australia, as the domestic supply chain lacks depth and manufacturing lead times are too long. The speed and cost advantages of Chinese production offset the additional compliance work needed to certify these imports for the Australian market.

Resisting prefab products made in China or elsewhere, He argued, does not make practical sense, as many buildings in Australia already utilise hybrid construction involving prefab components like drop toilets or panels imported from China and other countries. In fact, Australia imports most of its housing construction materials, of which an estimated 60 per cent come from China.

When it comes to prefab manufacturing and building, China actually has a better track record than Australia, with 6 per cent of houses currently built off-site and plans to increase this to 10-15 per cent driven by a domestic “green push”, according to prefabAus. In contrast, only around 5 per cent of Australian homes are currently constructed using prefab methods. However, both countries lag behind Scandinavian nations, which are the market leaders.

Economist James Laurenceson, director of the Australia-China Relations Institute, believes prefab housing could present an opportunity for increased trade between the two countries.

“The fact is that Australia struggles to meet its housing needs domestically, and no other country can supply prefab materials at a quality and price point like China can,” he said.

“Robust trade with China in the form of prefab materials will be a key factor that improves housing affordability in the coming years.”

CrowdStrike-Microsoft outage: Chinese cybersecurity firms take victory lap

https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3271248/crowdstrike-microsoft-outage-chinese-cybersecurity-firms-take-victory-lap?utm_source=rss_feed

Chinese cybersecurity companies are taking advantage of the massive Microsoft Windows outage that upended businesses and grounded flights around the world on Thursday and Friday by promoting their own software, as Beijing pushes to cut the country’s reliance on foreign suppliers.

Austin, Texas-based cybersecurity company CrowdStrike caused the outage, one of the largest in history, by pushing a bad software update that crashed the Windows operating system. It affected airports, banks, and hospitals, among many other businesses.

360 Security Technology, China’s largest cybersecurity firm, took the opportunity to promote its products, which it claimed were “more reliable, stable, comprehensive and intelligent”.

“When selecting endpoint security software, it is important to fully evaluate its defence capabilities to avoid potential security risks and ensure that business continuity and data security are not threatened,” it said in a social media post on Friday.

QAX, another well-known firm in the sector, wrote in a blog post on Friday that “software vendors involved in system stability need to have stricter quality control of their software”.

Tencent Holdings, which operates the Tencent PC Manager platform, said on Friday that it received reports from some users who experienced the Windows error screen, known as the blue screen of death. It referred users to CrowdStrike’s official workaround steps to resolve the problem.

The incident adds to Beijing’s list of reasons for seeking to move away from foreign technology as it pursues technological self-reliance in the face of mounting export restrictions and sanctions from Washington. Key infrastructure was largely unaffected in China, where only foreign businesses and luxury hotels were hit.

While Microsoft said on Friday that its systems had been restored, many businesses continued to deal with the fallout.

The Hong Kong International Airport, whose passenger check-in system collapsed, issued a notice on Saturday saying operations had returned to normal.

China’s cybersecurity market is dominated by local players. Beijing has long been phasing out software from companies like Russia’s Kaspersky Lab and US-based Symantec. CrowdStrike does not sell products and services in China, according to its website.

CrowdStrike shares fell 11.1 per cent to US$304.96 on the Nasdaq on Friday, while Microsoft edged down 0.74 per cent. Competitors SentinelOne and Palo Alto Networks gained 7.85 per cent and 2.16 per cent, respectively.

While China has pursued technological self-reliance to varying degrees for decades, the government’s mistrust of foreign commercial software deepened after the 2013 leaks from US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden revealed methods that the National Security Agency used to access information from some of the world’s biggest tech companies.

The government made a concerted push to completely switch to domestic security software a decade ago, according to a 2014 report by state-owned China News Service.

All the departments of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology have installed 360 software, the report said, and state-owned enterprises would follow by also installing domestic alternatives.

CrowdStrike has made monitoring for Chinese cyberattacks an important part of its business, as Western countries have warned of an increasing number of attacks coming from China-linked actors.

In 2015, the company reported seven Chinese cyberattacks against US technology and pharmaceutical companies. China’s foreign affairs spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at the time that “the Chinese government would not in any way participate, encourage or support enterprises in engaging in the theft of trade secrets”.

In its latest annual report, CrowdStrike said that “China-nexus adversaries increasingly targeted third-party relationships” in 2023.

China is the West’s corporate R&D lab. Can it remain so? | Business

https://www.economist.com/business/2024/07/18/china-is-the-wests-corporate-r-and-d-lab-can-it-remain-so

CHINA IS, FAMOUSLY, the world’s factory and a giant market for the world’s companies. More unremarked is its growing role as the world’s research-and-development laboratory. Between 2012 and 2021 foreign firms increased their collective Chinese research personnel by a fifth, to 716,000. Their annual R&D spending in the country almost doubled, to 338bn yuan ($52bn). Add investments by local firms and China now matches Europe’s R&D tally (see chart). Only America splurges more.