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21/01/2020

China virus fears grow as human transmission and fourth death confirmed

BEIJING (Reuters) – With millions of Asians travelling on Tuesday for the Lunar New Year holiday, authorities in China confirmed that a new virus could be spread through human contact, reporting 15 medical staff had been infected and a fourth person had died.

The chilling update on the coronavirus outbreak that began in the central city of Wuhan sent shivers through financial markets, as the World Health Organisation called a meeting for Wednesday to consider declaring an international health emergency.

By the end of Monday the number of confirmed cases in China had climbed to 291, the National Health Commission said. Some 270 were in Hubei province. Wuhan, a city of 11 million people is the provincial capital.

The outbreak was also spreading to other cities, with 15 cases in southern province of Guangdong, five in the capital Beijing and two in Shanghai.

RELATED COVERAGE

  • WHO says expects further spread of new coronavirus in China
  • Death toll from coronavirus outbreak in China’s Wuhan rises to six – state TV

“Information about newly reported infections suggest there may now be sustained human to human transmission,” WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific Takeshi Kasai said in an email statement.

The scare brought back bad memories of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), another coronavirus that broke out in China in 2002/2003, resulting in the death of nearly 800 people in global pandemic.

Health authorities around the world have begun to step up screening of travellers arriving from China. Two cases have already been identified in Thailand, one in Japan and one in South Korea, while the Philippines reported on Tuesday its first suspected case.

Wuhan Municipal Health Commission confirmed a fourth fatality on Tuesday, disclosing that an 89-year-old man who had underlying health issues, including heart disease, died on Jan. 19.

Chinese authorities also confirmed for the first time that the virus could spread through human contact and said 15 medical staff had been infected.

The mounting anxiety was transmitted to regional markets. China’s onshore yuan CNY= fell 0.6%, its biggest daily drop since Aug. 26, 2019, while airline and travel stocks fell across the region.

European shares also slipped on mounting concerns about the impact of the outbreak, with luxury goods firms particularly hard-hit on worries about weaker demand from Chinese consumers.

The virus can cause pneumonia, with symptoms including fever and difficulty in breathing. As those symptoms are similar to many other respiratory diseases, extra screening is needed.

AIRPORT SCREENING

The origin of the virus has yet to be identified, but the primary source is most likely animal, according to WHO. Chinese officials have linked the outbreak to a seafood market in Wuhan.

“The outbreak of a SARS-like coronavirus in Wuhan is developing into a major potential economic risk to the Asia-Pacific region now that there is medical evidence of human-to-human transmission,” said Rajiv Biswas, Asia Pacific Chief Economist for IHS Markit, in an email statement.

So far, the WHO has not recommended trade or travel restrictions but such measures could be discussed at Wednesday’s emergency meeting.

China’s National Health Commission will also give an update on the outbreak at a press briefing at 10 a.m. (0200 GMT) on Wednesday.

Foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said China will attend the WHO meeting and share relevant information.

“China is willing to deepen its global cooperation and work with the international community to work together to deal with the epidemic,” Geng told reporters at a regular daily briefing.

Airport authorities in the United States as well as most Asian nations also are screening passengers from Wuhan.

Australia on Tuesday said it would screen passengers on flights from Wuhan, while Singapore announced it would quarantine individuals with pneumonia and a history of travel to Wuhan within 14 days prior to the onset of symptoms.

QUEUES FOR MASKS

Wuhan officials have been using infrared thermometers to screen passengers at airports, railway stations and other passenger terminals since Jan. 14.

Zhong Nanshan, head of the National Health Commission’s team of experts investigating the outbreak, said in footage shown by state television on Monday there was no danger of a repeat of the SARS epidemic so long as precautions were taken.

Images of long lines of people queuing to buy face masks were circulating widely on Chinese social media, where the outbreak was one of the top trending topics.

Some online vendors were limiting sales of masks and hand sanitizers as demand surged.

And Shanghai’s market regulator warned on Tuesday that it will punish speculators who hoard masks and other products used for preventing diseases, according to the Shanghai Observer – a web publication backed by a Communist Party newspaper.

Trip.com, China’s top online travel booking platform, said it would refund customers who cancel bookings in Wuhan this month, or whose travel plans are disrupted by quarantines or other regulatory efforts to prevent the spread of the virus.

Source: Reuters

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19/11/2019

It’s a dirty job and I’m the one to do it, says millionaire who risks his reputation to break China’s litter habit

  • Every morning and night for the past four years, businessman Zhong Congrong has been on the streets of Chongqing to stop people dropping their litter
  • Admired as a welfare champion, the 54-year-old says he has been beaten and insulted for his cause
Zhong Congrong is a familiar figure on the streets of his hometown. Photo: Handout
Zhong Congrong is a familiar figure on the streets of his hometown. Photo: Handout

Zhong Congrong owns three businesses in southwestern China which together are worth more than 100 million yuan (US$14.3 million), but he prefers to risk being labelled as an environment “nut” who wants to clean up Chongqing.

Every morning after breakfast and each evening after supper, the entrepreneur pulls on an orange T-shirt, gets into his Mercedes-Benz SUV and heads downtown. For one or two hours, he walks the streets, picking scraps of rubbish off the road and talking to passers-by about littering.

“It is my mission to change people’s bad habits and to raise their awareness of protecting the environment,” said Zhong, who has been on this mission for four years. It has brought the 54-year-old civic rewards, earned him a bruising or two from people who do not want to listen to his message and it nearly cost him his marriage.

Throughout it all, he has remained a persistent voice for the environment in the city of more than 30 million people and, as some of them have learned, he refuses to give up.

Yang Zuhui (right) has come to admire Zhong Congrong’s dedication to his litter picking mission, but she fears for her husband’s safety. Photo: Weibo
Yang Zuhui (right) has come to admire Zhong Congrong’s dedication to his litter picking mission, but she fears for her husband’s safety. Photo: Weibo

On mainland China, cities have banned littering and some hit offenders with fines as high as 200 yuan. However, the rules are rarely obeyed and feebly enforced, and while there are plenty of dustbins in public places, litter is still a nuisance.

Zhong said his mission started in 2015 after he met a woman in her 70s in Sanya, the southern coastal city on the South China Sea island of Hainan. He was struck by how dedicated she and her husband were when they went litter picking each day.

“They are retired professors from a prestigious university in Beijing,” Zhong said. “I chatted a lot with her and I asked her, ‘What’s the point of collecting rubbish every day? You clean up the beach today, but tomorrow new rubbish appears’.”

The way to solve the problem was to teach people to not litter, she told him, but she said she “dared not” try to do that. Zhong said that encounter gave him his purpose and he would dare to change attitudes.

Shanghai recycling scheme slips up on 9,000 tonnes of waste

Back home, Zhong watched and learned – concluding that customers of restaurants and fast food businesses tended to be the people who dropped rubbish most.

“Perhaps it’s because when people dine in restaurants, they throw their rubbish wherever they like. Going outside, they keep on doing it,” he said.

“People in shopping malls are generally more civilised.”

Zhong says his mission began in 2015 during a holiday on the island of Hainan. Photo: Dickson Lee
Zhong says his mission began in 2015 during a holiday on the island of Hainan. Photo: Dickson Lee

While on patrol, Zhong makes himself easy to see in an orange T-shirt that bears his clean-up message. His tools include a metal pincer for picking up tissue paper, plastic bags, drinks bottles, nappies and other everyday detritus and putting it into bins.

He also carries a voice recorder that sends out an appeal to restaurant customers: “To protect our environment and not to affect our kids’ healthy growing up, dear friends, please don’t throw rubbish.”

Can China sort its household waste recycling problem by 2020?

Zhong said that at first he felt afraid and self-conscious when he stood in front of a crowd of diners with his green gospel. But time and practise taught him he had almost nothing to fear, he said.

One of the bigger challenges is getting through to the many people who do not listen to him and refuse to dispose of their rubbish the right way.

“It’s normal that our society has various kinds of people and I need to face this reality,” Zhong said. “I was prepared in my mind that I would be called ‘nut’ since this is such an arduous but fruitless cause.”

He tackles the problem with his usual persistence, so argument and persuasion is all part of the job. When Zhong insists the rule breakers take their rubbish and bin it, some ignore him and others walk away – but he is ready with an answer.

“I tell them, ‘If you don’t pick it up, I guarantee that you will lose face today. I will let passers-by see and hear what a humiliating thing you have done. Everybody will then condemn you and you will be embarrassed’,” he said.

When people tell him what they do is none of his business, Zhong replies that what he is doing is in the public interest.

Sometimes there is a heavier price. Zhong said he once watched several men in their 20s throw rubbish onto the road from their car. He set off after them in his SUV. He waylaid them and asked them to clean up after themselves – the men refused, swore at him and beat him up. Their day ended in a police station.

Zhong said he hoped his work would bring “positive energy” to the employees of his vehicle components and packaging materials companies, but his mission was not about business prestige.

However, last year, he was named as one of the top 10 public welfare figures of Chongqing by the municipal government, while his family was honoured as a Chinese good family by the semi-governmental All-China Women’s Federation, a women’s rights organisation established in 1949.

Street cleaner who found US$22,000 in rubbish refuses to accept a reward

There were trials for Zhong closer to home – his wife, Yang Zuhui, did not support his mission at first and threatened to divorce him.

“It’s OK that you picked up trash on the street and you were just another cleaner there,” she told him in an interview with Hunan Television in 2017. “But what worried me was that you tried to persuade others – physical violence [against him] was inevitable.”

She also said: “My husband is not very tall and, on many occasions, he was at a disadvantage and got beaten up. I am worried about his personal safety.”

Zhong impressed his daughter’s schoolfriends with an inspiring speech. Photo: Weibo
Zhong impressed his daughter’s schoolfriends with an inspiring speech. Photo: Weibo

But two years ago, their 10-year-old daughter helped change Yang’s attitude towards her husband’s mission after a school outing.

After lunch that day, Zhong gave the adults and children who had left rubbish behind one of his lectures.

His daughter, who was embarrassed by Zhong’s speech, came to appreciate him when classmates told her: “Your father is awesome. He is like a hero who protects the Earth.”

Yang was won over because she knew her husband was a determined man and once he decided on a course of action would not change his mind.

Their son – who is in his 20s and has returned to Chongqing after studying in France – always stands by his father, Zhong said.

“My son told me that environmental voluntary work normal abroad and it is respected,” he said.

Going out to collect rubbish has become part of Zhong’s life, he said.

“In the evening, if I stay at home, my wife and daughter will ask me ‘Why don’t you go to pick up rubbish?’”

He said it was important to go litter picking every day because the more he did it the more people he could influence.

“By breaking the littering habit, Chinese people can stand tall when they travel abroad,” Zhong said.

Source: SCMP

Posted in abroad, Admired, All-China Women's Federation, beaten, Beijing, break, bruising, businessman, cause, China’s, Chinese people, Chongqing, civic rewards, civilised, concluding, customers, dirty job, downtown, dropping, Entrepreneur, Every morning and night, fast food, four years, France, habit, Hainan, Hunan Television, insulted, learned, litter, marriage, Mercedes-Benz SUV, millionaire, orange T-shirt, People, personal safety, prestigious university, professors, reputation, restaurants, retired, Risks, Sanya, Shanghai, shopping malls, South China Sea, stand tall, stop, streets, travel, Uncategorized, watched, welfare champion, Zhong Congrong | Leave a Comment »

20/09/2019

China’s border region expedites reform to build a financial gateway for ASEAN

NANNING, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) — Pham Thi Nguyet Hoa, a vendor living in Vietnam’s Mong Cai, comes to Dongxing, a southern Chinese port city, to sell Vietnam fruits every day. When night falls, she often ends up with thousands of yuan in her pocket, much more than what she can earn at home.

“Most of my customers are Chinese, and it is very convenient to exchange Chinese yuan to Vietnamese Dong as many banks in Dongxing have this currency exchange service,” said Pham.

Tourism has been a pillar industry in the border city of southern China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Dongxing port saw 12 million people, of which half were tourists, pass through last year, ranking first among all land ports in China.

In the first six months this year, tourism consumption at the port exceeded 6.2 billion yuan (874 million U.S. dollars), up 40.4 percent from the year before.

The flourishing border tourism has brought a huge demand for currency exchange, with a slew of financial reforms rolled out in recent years.

In 2014, the ABC China (Dongxing Experimental Zone) ASEAN Currency business center was established in Dongxing, allowing direct convertibility of Chinese yuan and Vietnamese Dong.

In February 2018, a total of 8 million yuan was transferred in cash from Vietnam to China, marking the first cross-border cash transfer in Guangxi between China and Vietnam.

Fan Zuojun, vice president of Guangxi University, said the cross-border cash transfer will further promote the financial cooperation between China and Members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as well as deepen reform and push forward the internationalization of the Chinese currency in the region.

China and ASEAN countries have always maintained close relations in trade.

In January 2010, the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area was set up, which has significantly boosted bilateral trade. China has maintained its position as the largest trading partner of ASEAN for 10 consecutive years, and trade between China and ASEAN has skyrocketed tenfold from 16 years ago to 587.8 billion U.S. dollars in 2018.

In the first half of 2019, ASEAN became China’s second-largest trading partner, with bilateral trade volume reaching 291.85 billion U.S. dollars, up 4.2 percent year on year.

Guangxi’s geographical advantages have also given it huge development dividends over the past decades. ASEAN has been Guangxi’s largest trade partner for 19 consecutive years, and trade volume between Guangxi and ASEAN in the first seven months of this year topped 128 billion yuan, accounting for 48.7 percent of Guangxi’s total foreign trade.

Now with the launch of the Guangxi Pilot Free Trade Zone (FTZ) in August, bilateral trade exchanges are expected to embrace another golden opportunity.

The pilot FTZ, with a total area of nearly 120 square km, will focus on modern financial services, smart logistics, digital economy, port shipping logistics, international trade and cross-border tourism, among others.

Guangxi vows to make greater efforts to consolidate its financial strength and build itself into an ASEAN-oriented financial portal, with over 90 financial reform measures being rolled out to further facilitate trade and investment and promote innovation in financial services with ASEAN countries.

Source: Xinhua

Posted in ABC China (Dongxing Experimental Zone) ASEAN Currency business center, ASEAN, Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), build, China alert, China's border region, China-ASEAN Free Trade Area, Chinese, Chinese yuan, consumption, customers, Dongxing, exchange, expedites, financial gateway, first, Guangxi Pilot Free Trade Zone (FTZ), Guangxi University, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, land ports, Nanning, night, pillar industry, port city, ranking, reform, sell, Tourism, tourists, Uncategorized, Vietnam, Vietnam fruits, Vietnamese Dong | Leave a Comment »

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