Chindia Alert: You’ll be Living in their World Very Soon
aims to alert you to the threats and opportunities that China and India present. China and India require serious attention; case of ‘hidden dragon and crouching tiger’.
Without this attention, governments, businesses and, indeed, individuals may find themselves at a great disadvantage sooner rather than later.
The POSTs (front webpages) are mainly 'cuttings' from reliable sources, updated continuously.
The PAGEs (see Tabs, above) attempt to make the information more meaningful by putting some structure to the information we have researched and assembled since 2006.
China will not set an economic growth goal for this year as it deals with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.
It is the first time Beijing has not had a gross domestic product (GDP) target since 1990 when records began.
The announcement was made by Premier Li Keqiang at the start of the country’s annual parliament meeting.
The world’s second largest economy shrank by 6.8% in the first quarter from a year ago as lockdowns paralysed businesses.
“This is because our country will face some factors that are difficult to predict in its development due to the great uncertainty regarding the Covid-19 pandemic and the world economic and trade environment,” Premier Li said.
The country’s leadership has promised to boost economic support measures amid growing concerns that rising unemployment could threaten social stability.
The move comes as tensions between Beijing and Washington are becoming increasingly strained over the coronavirus pandemic, trade and Hong Kong.
On Thursday, President Donald Trump stepped up his attacks on China, suggesting that the country’s leader, Xi Jinping, is behind a “disinformation and propaganda attack on the United States and Europe.”
It came as Mr Trump and other Republicans have escalated their criticism of Beijing’s handling of the early stages of the outbreak.
Also on Thursday, China announced plans to impose new national security legislation on Hong Kong after last year’s pro-democracy protests.
The announcement was met with a warning from Mr Trump that the US would react “very strongly” against any attempt to gain more control over the former British colony.
Separately, two US senators have proposed legislation to punish Chinese entities involved in enforcing the planned new laws and penalise banks that do business with them.
Earlier this week, the US Senate unanimously passed a proposal to delist Chinese companies from American stock exchanges if they fail to comply with US financial reporting standards.
US-listed Chinese companies have come under increasing scrutiny in recent weeks after Luckin Coffee revealed that an internal investigation found hundreds of millions of dollars of its sales last year were “fabricated”.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption The Chinese city of Wuhan recently lifted its strict quarantine measures
The Chinese city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus originated last year, has raised its official Covid-19 death toll by 50%, adding 1,290 fatalities.
Wuhan officials attributed the new figure to updated reporting and deaths outside hospitals. China has insisted there was no cover-up.
It has been accused of downplaying the severity of its virus outbreak.
Wuhan’s 11 million residents spent months in strict lockdown conditions, which have only recently been eased.
The latest official figures bring the death toll in the city in China’s central Hubei province to 3,869, increasing the national total to more than 4,600.
China has confirmed nearly 84,000 coronavirus infections, the seventh-highest globally, according to Johns Hopkins University data.
What’s China’s explanation for the rise in deaths?
In a statement released on Friday, officials in Wuhan said the revised figures were the result of new data received from multiple sources, including records kept by funeral homes and prisons.
Deaths linked to the virus outside hospitals, such as people who died at home, had not previously been recorded.
Media caption Learn how Wuhan dealt with the lockdown
The “statistical verification” followed efforts by authorities to “ensure that information on the city’s Covid-19 epidemic is open, transparent and the data [is] accurate”, the statement said.
It added that health systems were initially overwhelmed and cases were “mistakenly reported” – in some instances counted more than once and in others missed entirely.
A shortage of testing capacity in the early stages meant that many infected patients were not accounted for, it said.
A spokesman for China’s National Health Commission, Mi Feng, said the new death count came from a “comprehensive review” of epidemic data.
In its daily news conference, the foreign ministry said accusations of a cover-up, which have been made most stridently on the world stage by US President Donald Trump, were unsubstantiated. “We’ll never allow any concealment,” a spokesman said.
Why are there concerns over China’s figures?
Friday’s revised figures come amid growing international concern that deaths in China have been under-reported. Questions have also been raised about Beijing’s handling of the epidemic, particularly in its early stages.
In December 2019, Chinese authorities launched an investigation into a mysterious viral pneumonia after cases began circulating in Wuhan.
China reported the cases to the World Health Organization (WHO), the UN’s global health agency, on 31 December.
But WHO experts were only allowed to visit China and investigate the outbreak on 10 February, by which time the country had more than 40,000 cases.
The mayor of Wuhan has previously admitted there was a lack of action between the start of January – when about 100 cases had been confirmed – and 23 January, when city-wide restrictions were enacted.
Around that time, a doctor who tried to warn his colleagues about an outbreak of a Sars-like virus was silenced by the authorities. Dr Li Wenliang later died from Covid-19.
Wuhan’s death toll increase of almost exactly 50% has left some analysts wondering if this is all a bit too neat.
For months questions have been asked about the veracity of China’s official coronavirus statistics.
The inference has been that some Chinese officials may have deliberately under-reported deaths and infections to give the impression that cities and towns were successfully managing the emergency.
If that was the case, Chinese officials were not to know just how bad this crisis would get in other countries, making its own figures now seem implausibly small.
The authorities in Wuhan, where the first cluster of this disease was reported, said there had been no deliberate misrepresentation of data, rather that a stabilisation in the emergency had allowed them time to revisit the reported cases and to add any previously missed.
That the new death toll was released at the same time as a press conference announcing a total collapse in China’s economic growth figures has led some to wonder whether this was a deliberate attempt to bury one or other of these stories.
Then again, it could also be a complete coincidence.
China has been pushing back against US suggestions that the coronavirus came from a laboratory studying infectious diseases in Wuhan, the BBC’s Barbara Plett Usher in Washington DC reports.
US President Donald Trump and some of his officials have been flirting with the outlier theory in the midst of a propaganda war with China over the origin and handling of the pandemic, our correspondent says.
Mr Trump this week halted funding for the World Health Organization (WHO), accusing it of making deadly mistakes and overly trusting China.
“Do you really believe those numbers in this vast country called China, and that they have a certain number of cases and a certain number of deaths; does anybody really believe that?” Mr Trump said at the White House on Wednesday.
On Thursday, UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said: “We’ll have to ask the hard questions about how [coronavirus] came about and how it couldn’t have been stopped earlier.”
But China has also been praised for its handling of the crisis and the unprecedented restrictions that it instituted to slow the spread of the virus.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption The Chinese city of Wuhan recently lifted its strict quarantine measures
The Chinese city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus originated last year, has raised its official Covid-19 death toll by 50%, adding 1,290 fatalities.
Wuhan officials attributed the new figure to updated reporting and deaths outside hospitals. China has insisted there was no cover-up.
It has been accused of downplaying the severity of its virus outbreak.
Wuhan’s 11 million residents spent months in strict lockdown conditions, which have only recently been eased.
The latest official figures bring the death toll in the city in China’s central Hubei province to 3,869, increasing the national total to more than 4,600.
China has confirmed nearly 84,000 coronavirus infections, the seventh-highest globally, according to Johns Hopkins University data.
What’s China’s explanation for the rise in deaths?
In a statement released on Friday, officials in Wuhan said the revised figures were the result of new data received from multiple sources, including records kept by funeral homes and prisons.
Deaths linked to the virus outside hospitals, such as people who died at home, had not previously been recorded.
Media caption Learn how Wuhan dealt with the lockdown
The “statistical verification” followed efforts by authorities to “ensure that information on the city’s Covid-19 epidemic is open, transparent and the data [is] accurate”, the statement said.
It added that health systems were initially overwhelmed and cases were “mistakenly reported” – in some instances counted more than once and in others missed entirely.
A shortage of testing capacity in the early stages meant that many infected patients were not accounted for, it said.
A spokesman for China’s National Health Commission, Mi Feng, said the new death count came from a “comprehensive review” of epidemic data.
In its daily news conference, the foreign ministry said accusations of a cover-up, which have been made most stridently on the world stage by US President Donald Trump, were unsubstantiated. “We’ll never allow any concealment,” a spokesman said.
Why are there concerns over China’s figures?
Friday’s revised figures come amid growing international concern that deaths in China have been under-reported. Questions have also been raised about Beijing’s handling of the epidemic, particularly in its early stages.
In December 2019, Chinese authorities launched an investigation into a mysterious viral pneumonia after cases began circulating in Wuhan.
China reported the cases to the World Health Organization (WHO), the UN’s global health agency, on 31 December.
But WHO experts were only allowed to visit China and investigate the outbreak on 10 February, by which time the country had more than 40,000 cases.
The mayor of Wuhan has previously admitted there was a lack of action between the start of January – when about 100 cases had been confirmed – and 23 January, when city-wide restrictions were enacted.
Around that time, a doctor who tried to warn his colleagues about an outbreak of a Sars-like virus was silenced by the authorities. Dr Li Wenliang later died from Covid-19.
Wuhan’s death toll increase of almost exactly 50% has left some analysts wondering if this is all a bit too neat.
For months questions have been asked about the veracity of China’s official coronavirus statistics.
The inference has been that some Chinese officials may have deliberately under-reported deaths and infections to give the impression that cities and towns were successfully managing the emergency.
If that was the case, Chinese officials were not to know just how bad this crisis would get in other countries, making its own figures now seem implausibly small.
The authorities in Wuhan, where the first cluster of this disease was reported, said there had been no deliberate misrepresentation of data, rather that a stabilisation in the emergency had allowed them time to revisit the reported cases and to add any previously missed.
That the new death toll was released at the same time as a press conference announcing a total collapse in China’s economic growth figures has led some to wonder whether this was a deliberate attempt to bury one or other of these stories.
Then again, it could also be a complete coincidence.
But China has also been praised for its handling of the crisis and the unprecedented restrictions that it instituted to slow the spread of the virus. WHO Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has hailed China for the “speed with which [it] detected the outbreak” and its “commitment to transparency”.
US President Donald Trump this week halted funding for the WHO, accusing it of making deadly mistakes and overly trusting China.
“Do you really believe those numbers in this vast country called China, and that they have a certain number of cases and a certain number of deaths; does anybody really believe that?” Mr Trump said at the White House on Wednesday.
On Thursday, UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said: “We’ll have to ask the hard questions about how [coronavirus] came about and how it couldn’t have been stopped earlier.”
BEIJING (Reuters) – For Zhang Yu, who runs a cafe in one of Beijing’s top tourist spots, business has never been so bad.
To contain the spread of the coronavirus, bars and cafes in the Wudaoying hutong – a top Lonely Planet destination built around a narrow lane – are permitted to provide take-away services only. Non-residents must show proof they have an appointment to enter the area.
Added to which, tourism has plummeted.
“Don’t mention it! This is supposed to be the peak season,” said Zhang, who has run her cafe for five years. “But there are almost no customers as they (authorities) don’t want to have people hanging around here.”
While China’s manufacturing and retail sectors are starting to get back to work as the pace of new infections slows sharply, tourism sites in Beijing remain a shadow of their former and bustling self.
China’s capital city has maintained the highest level of emergency response to the outbreak, so tourist attractions like the Forbidden City remain closed. A 14-day quarantine for new arrivals has stifled travel.
As a result, small business owners running restaurants, souvenir shops and tourism agencies are struggling.
Only a little over 20% of tourism-related businesses in Beijing had resumed operation as of the three-day Qingming national holiday in early April, a survey by on-demand delivery service giant Meituan Dianping showed.
HANGING ON
The only people present in Wudaoying on a recent afternoon were a few elderly residents sitting outside to enjoy the spring sunshine. A cat made its way lazily through empty rooftop bars.
“We used to see more customers in one hour in pre-virus days than we see in a whole day right now,” said a worker at a sandwich restaurant in Wudaoying.
In another popular area, Khazzy, a 32-year-old doctoral student who opened a restaurant last October, has had only four customers all day.
“There are almost no tourists coming to Beijing and the remaining locals have concerns about eating out,” Khazzy said as sunset approached.
Khazzy said he has let five of his 13 staff go and has no idea how long he can stay afloat financially even though his landlord has agreed to waive one month’s rent on the property in Qianmen, near Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
More than half of the shops in Qianmen remain closed. The manager of a state-backed noodle restaurant said most of the closed stores are privately owned small businesses that can’t secure enough business to support their daily operations.
She said revenues at the noodle restaurant have plunged more than 80%, but staff salaries have not been cut.
Zhang, the cafe owner in Wudaoying, reckoned small businesses could hold on for the next three months.
BEIJING, April 9 (Xinhua) — Chinese political advisors on Thursday attended a voluntary tree-planting activity in Beijing, as part of their efforts to contribute to building a Beautiful China.
The event was held at the Xishan National Forest Park in Beijing’s Haidian District, during which over 400 saplings of different types of trees were planted.
It was attended by vice chairpersons of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and more than 100 staff members of the working organs of the CPPCC National Committee.
The CPPCC National Committee working organs have consistently organized voluntary tree-planting activities in spring for years.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption Mr Trump is making his first official visit to India
US President Donald Trump is expecting a raucous welcome on his first official state visit to India on Monday and Tuesday.
He follows a long line of leaders who have made the journey. Some of his predecessors were greeted enthusiastically; others stumbled through diplomatic gaffes; one even had a village named after him.
Can history be a guide to how this diplomatic tryst might go? Here’s a brief look at past visits, ranked in order of how they went.
The good: President Eisenhower
Let’s begin at the beginning.
Dwight D Eisenhower, the first US president to visit India, was greeted with a 21-gun salute when he landed in the national capital, Delhi, in December 1959. Huge crowds lined the streets to catch a glimpse of the World War Two hero in his open-top car – Mr Trump is expecting a similar reception in Ahmedabad city, where he will be doing a road show.
Image copyright US EMBASSY ARCHIVESImage caption Dwight D Eisenhower, pictured with Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, was the first US president to make the trip
The warmth between President Eisenhower and Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru helped during what was a rocky phase in US-India ties. This was early in the Cold war, when the US and Pakistan had become become close allies, and India insisted on staying neutral or “non-aligned”. Like today, relations with China were at the core of the India-US equation, with Washington pressuring Delhi to take an aggressive stance with Beijing on the issue of Tibet.
But, on the whole, Eisenhower’s four-day trip was billed a success. And nearly every US president on a state visit to India has emulated his itinerary: he laid flowers at Mahatma Gandhi’s memorial, took in the splendour of the Taj Mahal, addressed parliament and spoke at Delhi’s iconic Ramlila grounds, which, according to one news report, attracted one million people.
When he left, Nehru said he had taken with him “a piece of our heart”.
Image copyright US EMBASSY ARCHIVESImage caption President Eisenhower was greeted by large crowdsThe game-changer: Bill Clinton
If there was a game-changing visit, it would be Bill Clinton’s in March 2000 with Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Mr Clinton’s arrival came after a two-decade lull – neither Ronald Reagan nor George Bush Snr made the journey East. It came at a tricky time as Washington had imposed sanctions on Delhi following its 1999 test of a nuclear bomb.
But, according to Navtej Sarna, a former Indian Ambassador to the US, the five-day trip was “a joyous visit”. It included stops in Hyderabad, a southern city that was emerging as a tech hub, and Mumbai, India’s financial capital. “He came and saw the economic and cyber potential of India, and democracy in action,” says Mr Sarna.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption Bill Clinton’s visit was described as “joyous”Mr Clinton also danced with villagers, took a tiger safari and sampled Delhi’s famously creamy black dal (lentils) at a luxury hotel that has since been associated with the president.
The country’s reaction is perhaps best expressed in this New York Times headline: “Clinton fever – a delighted India has all the symptoms.”
The nuclear deal: George W Bush
George W Bush, as Forbes magazine once put it, was the “best US president India’s ever had”. His three-day visit in March 2006 was a highlight in the two countries’ strategic relationship – especially in matters of trade and nuclear technology, subjects they have long wrangled over. His strong personal dynamic with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was hard to miss – after he left office, Mr Bush, a keen artist, even painted a portrait of Mr Singh.
The two leaders are credited for a historic but controversial nuclear deal, which was signed during Mr Bush’s visit. It brought India, which had for decades refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), out of isolation. Energy-hungry India got access to US civil nuclear technology in exchange for opening its nuclear facilities to inspection.
Image copyright US EMBASSY ARCHIVESImage caption George W Bush and Manmohan Singh had a very good relationshipHowever, while the visit was substantive, it was not as spectacular as others – there was no trip to the Taj, nor an address to parliament. But the timing was important. Anti-US sentiment over the invasion of Iraq was running high – left-wing MPs had staged a protest against Mr Bush’s visit, and there were demonstrations in other parts of India.
Double visit: Barack Obama
Barack Obama was the only president to make two official visits. First, in 2010 with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, and then in 2015 with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
On his first visit – in a break from the past – he landed in Mumbai, instead of Delhi, with a large trade delegation. This was not just about economic ties but a show of solidarity following the Mumbai terror attacks of 2008, which killed 166 people. Mr and Mrs Obama even stayed at the Taj Mahal hotel, one of the main targets.
It was significant that the US president declared support for India to join a reformed and expanded UN Security Council, says Alyssa Ayres, a former US deputy assistant secretary of state for South Asia. “That all these years later nothing has changed in the UN system is another matter, but that was a major policy shift for the United States.”
Image copyright US EMBASSY ARCHIVESImage caption Barack Obama visited India twiceMr Obama returned in 2015 as chief guest at India’s Republic Day celebrations, at PM Modi’s invitation. Trade, defence and climate change were at the heart of the talks. The trip also emphasised an Indo-Pacific strategy, where both leaders expressed unease over Beijing’s provocations in the South China Sea.
The not-so-good: Jimmy Carter
Although Jimmy Carter’s two-day visit in 1978 was a thaw in India-US relations, it was not free of hiccups.
With some 500 reporters in tow, Carter followed a packed itinerary: he met Prime Minister Morarji Desai, addressed a joint session of parliament, went to the Taj Mahal, and dropped by a village just outside Delhi.
The village, Chuma Kheragaon, had a personal connection: Carter’s mother, Lillian, had visited here when she was in India as a member of the Peace Corps in the late 1960s. So when Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, made the trip, they gave the village money and its first television set. It was even renamed “Carterpuri”, a moniker it still holds.
Image copyright US EMBASSY ARCHIVESImage caption Jimmy Carter being greeted by villagers of ‘Carterpuri’But beyond the photo-ops, India and the US were sparring. India was building its nuclear programme, and had conducted its first test in 1974. The US wanted India to sign the NPF, which sought to stop the spread of nuclear weapons. But India refused, saying the agreement discriminated against developing countries.
In a leaked conversation that made headlines and threatened to derail the visit, Mr Carter promised his Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, a “very cold and very blunt” letter to Desai. The two leaders signed a declaration, promising greater global co-operation, but Carter left India without the assurances he had hoped for.
The ugly: Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon was no stranger to India when he arrived in August 1969 for a day-long state visit. He had been here as vice-president in 1953, and before that on personal trips. But, by all accounts, he wasn’t a fan.
“Nixon disliked Indians in general and despised [Prime Minister] Indira Gandhi,” according to Gary Bass, author of Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger and a Forgotten Genocide. And, he adds, the feeling was said to be mutual.
This was also at the height of the Cold War, and India’s non-alignment policy “appalled” American presidents. Mr Bass says that under Gandhi, India’s neutrality had turned into a “noticeably pro-Soviet foreign policy”.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption Richard Nixon waves to the crowds alongside Mohammad Hidyatullah, India’s acting presidentThe relationship only turned frostier after the trip as India backed Bangladesh (then East Pakistan) in its fight for independence from Pakistan, a close American ally. The differences were laid bare when Gandhi visited the White House in 1971. Declassified state department cables later revealed that Nixon referred to her as an “old witch”.
And the future: Donald Trump
The US and India have certainly had their ups and downs, but during the last official visit in 2015, Mr Obama and Mr Modi signed a declaration of friendship: “Chalein saath saath (Let’s move forward together)…” it began.
President Trump’s visit will take the relationship forward, but it’s unclear how.
Image copyright AFP
His arrival in Ahmedabad, the main city in PM Modi’s home state of Gujarat, followed by a big arena event, is expected to draw a massive crowd. It will echo President Eisenhower’s rally in Delhi years ago, perhaps cementing the personal ties between the two leaders.
But while Mr Trump’s trip will be packed with pageantry, it could be light on policy. Unlike other presidential visits, this one is not expected to yield concrete agreements, with the trade deal Mr Trump so badly wants looking unlikely.
The measures China has taken to stop the spread of the coronavirus are starting to have an impact, Mi Feng, a spokesman at the National Health Commission, said on Sunday.
In other developments:
The number of people who have tested positive on the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which is being held in quarantine in Japan, has risen to 355. The US and Canada are sending planes to evacuate their citizens
A Chinese tourist has died in France – the first fatality outside Asia
An 83-year-old American woman has tested positive after disembarking another cruise ship that was turned away by a number of countries before being allowed to dock in Cambodia
In the UK, all but one of nine people being treated have been discharged from hospital
On Saturday, World Health Organization (WHO) head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus praised Beijing’s response to the outbreak.
“China has bought the world time. We don’t know how much time,” he said. “We’re encouraged that outside China, we have not yet seen widespread community transmission.”
How is China coping?
Tens of millions of Chinese still face heavy restrictions on their day-to-day life as part of the government’s efforts to halt the spread of the disease, which causes a disease named Covid-19.
Much of the response has focused on the hard-hit province of Hubei and its capital Wuhan, where the outbreak began. The city is all but sealed off from the rest of the country.
Foreign Minister Wang Yi said that along with a drop in infections within Hubei there had also been a rapid increase in the number of people who had recovered.
China’s central bank will also disinfect and store used banknotes before recirculating them in a bid to stop the virus spreading.
Media caption Medics in Wuhan resort to shaving their heads in a bid to prevent cross-infection of the coronavirus
In another development Chinese state media published a speech from earlier this month in which Chinese President Xi Jinping said he said he had given instructions on 7 January on containing the outbreak.
At the time, local officials in the city of Wuhan were downplaying the severity of the epidemic.
This would suggest senior leaders were aware of the potential dangers of the virus before the information was made public.
With the government facing criticism for its handling of the outbreak, analysts suggest the disclosure is an attempt to show the party leadership acted decisively from the start.
Image caption Chinese farmers are trying to bring workers across the border into Russia
The farm in Maksimovka is surrounded by high metal fences. The Chinese migrants who work there only leave the site to go shopping. At the centre of this village in Russia’s Far East sits an old abandoned building – there is no lock on the door and inside, the floor is littered with papers dating back to the 1980s and 90s.
Here lie clues to why a farm that once provided work to some 400 Russians was unable to survive.
Like many of the collective farms in rural Russia, the Mayak farm collapsed with the old Soviet Union.
That is when the Chinese workers arrived, in five border regions, and Russians have not always been happy to welcome their new neighbours.
Image caption Little remains of the old farm at Mayak, apart from a monument to those killed in World War Two
“Working in Russia is much the same as in China. You get up in the morning and go to work,” says Chom Vampen.
He is one of thousands of Chinese who have moved to this vast, under-populated part of Russia since the early 1990s.
Most seek work at Russian- or Chinese-owned farms or buy the lease on the land to develop their own agricultural enterprises.
As Russia’s relations with the West have deteriorated, President Vladimir Putin has welcomed China’s growing footprint here.
Image caption Chinese farm workers from Maksimovka
Mayak’s chairman, Yevgeny Fokin, leased thousands of hectares to Chinese entrepreneurs, attracted by low rents and large farms.
“We gave the shares to Fokin, thinking it would be better if the land belonged to the collective. But he gave it all to the Chinese and left, and we lost everything,” a local resident of Maksimovka village, Tatyana Ivanovna, said.
“No way,” says Mr Fokin. “There was nothing unusual about it.”
How Chinese companies took over
Chinese companies first appeared in Russia’s Far East in the early 2000s, but Beijing’s interest in the region increased after the global financial crisis of 2008.
“There was panic, [the Chinese] were looking at where to invest,” the head of a Chinese-owned farm told BBC Russian, preferring not to give his name.
Chinese investment was followed by an influx of Chinese migrants.
“We have little land and a lot of people,” said one Chinese farmer.
Based on data released by the state land register, BBC Russian calculated that Chinese citizens either owned or leased at least 350,000 hectares (3,500 sq km) of Far Eastern land in Russia. In 2018, around 2.2 million hectares of Russian land in the region was used for agricultural purposes.
The actual proportion could be higher, the BBC has learned
Chinese farmers are, according to BBC research, represented in 40% of the Far East, most significantly in the Jewish autonomous region of Birobidzhan.
Regional governor Alexander Levintal said that in many cases land officially leased by Russians was in reality managed by Chinese nationals.
“Almost all the land that belonged to collectives was handed over to the Chinese,” said the head of the Jewish autonomous region’s peasant association, Alexander Larik.
Why relations are uneasy
Most of the farms run by Chinese migrants resemble fortresses. At Babstovo, a half-hour drive from the Chinese border, lies Friendship farm, which is surrounded by a high fence and a red flag.
Image caption Chinese workers here are main seasonal and rarely settle in Russia
But things are different in the village of Opitnoye Polye, where Xin Jie employs Russian as well as Chinese workers.
Like many Chinese here, he adopted a Russian name and is now known as Chinese Dima.
Chinese Dima moved to Russia in the 1990s and leased more than 2,500 hectares of land to develop a soya plantation. He is actively involved in the community, buying presents for nursery school children and sending his tractor to help clear the snow in remote villages in the winter.
Conflicts between Russians and Chinese are not uncommon. In 2015, three Russians entered a Chinese factory in the Far Eastern Amur region and threatened a Chinese guard with a stick, demanding he give them food.
A few days later, when they returned to steal a tractor engine, they were confronted by the same Chinese guard who this time carried an axe.
They were given prison sentences ranging from five to nine years.
Most Chinese cross the border for seasonal work, for sowing or harvesting, and then return home.
But many Russians are unhappy with the Chinese influx. More than one in three people said they viewed China’s Russia policy as expansion, according to a poll conducted in 2017 by the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Almost half said that China threatened Russia’s territorial integrity, while a third believed that it endangered their country’s economic development.
Image caption A Chinese woman hangs out the washing on a farm at Dimitrovo
“They leave at seven in the morning and return after dark. I don’t see them and they don’t see me,” says Ivanovich of his Chinese neighbours in the village of Dimitrovo.
But some Russians have struck up friendships with the Chinese.
“They bring beer, we drink. I give them eggs and honey,” says Alexander.
Why Russian workers struggle to compete
Chinese farm workers in Russia’s Far East often have a better reputation than their Russian counterparts.
“The Chinese do not drink and they have nowhere to run; they come here for the season. Our citizens come to work for a week, plead for money and then go on a bender,” complained one Russian agricultural boss who declined to give his name.
Mr Larik, of the peasant association in the Jewish autonomous region, said Chinese farm owners generally preferred hiring Chinese migrants and gave Russian nationals low-skilled jobs.
A Chinese farmer who asked to stay anonymous complained about the drinking habits of Russian employees.
“All Russians drink. Today you pay them, tomorrow they do not show up. There are problems with discipline,” he said.
Image caption Residents in Maksimovka complain that young people tend to head to the cities, leaving only pensioners behind
Russia has a poor record of protecting workers’ rights, especially in the agriculture industry, which is generally low paid.
Not everyone here has a low opinion of local workers.
“What is the difference between Russian and Chinese workers? Russian workers are smarter than the Chinese,” says Chom Vampen.
BEIJING (Reuters) – Beijing’s new $63 billion Daxing airport began its first scheduled international flights on Sunday as it ramped up operations to help relieve pressure on the city’s existing Capital airport.
Shaped like a phoenix – though to some observers it is more reminiscent of a starfish – the airport was designed by famed Iraqi-born architect Zaha Hadid, and formally opened in late September ahead of the Oct. 1 celebrations of the 70th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China.
It boasts four runways and is expected to handle up to 72 million passengers a year by 2025, eventually reaching 100 million.
China Southern Airlines (600029.SS) and China Eastern Airlines (600115.SS) will be the main domestic carriers at Daxing, though Air China (601111.SS) will provide a small number of flights too.
An Air China flight to Bangkok was the first international flight to leave on Sunday, while British Airways (ICAG.L) will operate the first transcontinental flight, to London.
About 50 foreign airlines, including Finnair (FIA1S.HE), plan to move all or part of their China operations to the airport in the coming quarters.
The relocation of all the airlines which will use Daxing is to due to be completed by the winter of 2021. Air China and its Star Alliance partners will remain mostly at Capital airport.
The airport, roughly the size of 100 football fields and expected to become one of the world’s busiest, has come in for some criticism due to its distance from central Beijing.
By public transport it takes over an hour to reach it from Beijing’s central business district, more than double the time needed to reach Capital airport, which strains at the seams and is often hit by delays.
Officials say Daxing airport is not only designed to serve Beijing, but also the surrounding province of Hebei and next-door city of Tianjin, to boost regional development.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 