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.
KATHMANDU, April 19 (Xinhua) — A German scholar has recently found that the right to education for Uygurs and people of other ethnic groups is well protected in China’s Xinjiang region, as young people there enjoy increasingly better opportunities.
Michael Heinrich, who has been teaching German in Minzu University of China for more than five years, said in an article published on Online Khabar news website in March that he has “paid close attention to the development of Chinese education in recent years, especially the education situation in ethnic minority areas.”
Heinrich said he has taught a Xinjiang Uygur student, who often talks with him about the education situation in her hometown and appreciates government policies on education.
The Uygur student has told Heinrich that she lives in a place where she receives Islamic religious education and China’s nine-year compulsory education, and the Uygur students in Xinjiang can enjoy preferential policies, such as extra points in college entrance examination, special policies for college admissions, and employment policy support.
In recent years, the Chinese government has intensified policy support on education in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, and increased investment in educational resources, especially those on vocational education, the article read.
“Through vocational education, more Uyghur Muslim students can enhance their survival skills and work harder by themselves and improve their living standards with these hands,” it said.
For some time, Xinjiang has been plagued by terrorism, religious extremism and separatism, according to the passage, and carrying out vocational education and training in Xinjiang is an effective measure to promote the rule of law and a practical action to protect the vital interests of people of all ethnic groups there.
It is also a just move in fighting extremism and terrorism to contribute to the stability in Xinjiang, it added.
Some Western media outlets as well as some U.S. politicians often slander the Chinese government under the guise of “human rights,” which does not only disregard the facts but also interferes with China’s sovereignty, Heinrich pointed out.
The situation in Xinjiang that they saw was completely different from the stories told by some Western politicians and media, Heinrich quoted some people who have visited Xinjiang and witnessed its development as saying.
The rights to life and development of people of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang are protected to the largest extent, Heinrich added.
Fans greeted the team as they arrived in Wuhan via train
Chinese Super League team Wuhan Zall made an emotional homecoming after being unable to return for three months because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Players had initially stayed at their winter training camp in Spain when the virus peaked in Wuhan in January.
After a prolonged transit in Germany, they landed in Shenzhen on 16 March and underwent three weeks’ quarantine.
They were greeted by fans when they arrived in Wuhan by train on Saturday evening.
“After more than three months of wandering, the homesick Wuhan Zall team members finally set foot in their hometown,” the team said on the Twitter-like Weibo.
Fans, dressed in the team’s orange colours, sang and gave the players flowers as they arrived home for the first time in 104 days.
Players will now spend time with their families before training resumes.
The team had first left Wuhan in early January to start preparing for the Super League season.
By the time they arrived in Malaga, residents in Wuhan were living under strict lockdown measures, and there were no planes or trains in or out of the capital.
Coach Jose Gonzalez told Spanish media at the time that the players “are not walking viruses, they are athletes” and asked for them not to be demonised.
The Chinese Super League was set to begin on 22 February but it has been postponed.
URUMQI, April 18 (Xinhua) — A medical team of eight experts who aided Pakistan’s fight against COVID-19 returned Friday night to Urumqi, capital of northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.
The team, consisting of experts in various fields including respiratory, critical care and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), arrived in Pakistan on March 28 and visited cities of Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi.
The Chinese experts communicated with the Pakistani federal government, national and local health authorities, hospitals and medical schools, as well as the Red Crescent.
The team members shared their experience through several video conferences and offered practical, specific suggestions to their Pakistani peers concerning the diagnosis, clinical treatment and epidemiologic study of COVID-19, and the application of TCM, hospital infection control and the construction of temporary hospitals.
The team also assisted with improving Pakistan’s guidelines on diagnosis and treatment of COVID-19 to help build an efficient epidemic prevention and control system in Pakistan and enhance its screening and testing capabilities.
Meanwhile, the experts carried out epidemic prevention guidance and popular science education for the Chinese embassy in Pakistan, Chinese enterprises, overseas Chinese and Chinese students in the country.
Faced with a backlash from the West over its handling of the early stages of the pandemic, Beijing has been quietly gaining ground in Asia
Teams of experts and donations of medical supplies have been largely welcomed by China’s neighbours
Despite facing some criticism from the West, China’s Asian neighbours have welcomed its medical expertise and vital supplies. Photo: Xinhua
While China’s campaign to mend its international image in the wake of its handling of the coronavirus health crisis has been met with scepticism and even a backlash from the US and its Western allies, Beijing has been quietly gaining ground in Asia.
Teams of experts have been sent to Cambodia, the Philippines, Myanmar, Pakistan and soon to Malaysia, to share their knowledge from the pandemic’s ground zero in central China.
China has also held a series of online “special meetings” with its Asian neighbours, most recently on Tuesday when Premier Li Keqiang discussed his country’s experiences in combating the disease and rebooting a stalled economy with the leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), Japan and South Korea.
Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang speaks to Asean Plus Three leaders during a virtual summit on Tuesday. Photo: AP
Many Western politicians have publicly questioned Beijing’s role and its subsequent handling of the crisis but Asian leaders – including Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe – have been reluctant to blame the Chinese government, while also facing criticism at home for not closing their borders with China soon enough to prevent the spread of the virus.
An official from one Asian country said attention had shifted from the early stages of the outbreak – when disgruntled voices among the public were at their loudest – as people watched the virus continue its deadly spread through their homes and across the world.
“Now everybody just wants to get past the quarantine,” he said. “China has been very helpful to us. It’s also closer to us so it’s easier to get shipments from them. The [medical] supplies keep coming, which is what we need right now.”
The official said also that while the teams of experts sent by Beijing were mainly there to observe and offer advice, the gesture was still appreciated.
Another Asian official said the tardy response by Western governments in handling the outbreak had given China an advantage, despite its initial lack of transparency over the outbreak.
“The West is not doing a better job on this,” he said, adding that his government had taken cues from Beijing on the use of propaganda in shaping public opinion and boosting patriotic sentiment in a time of crisis.
“Because it happened in China first, it has given us time to observe what works in China and adopt [these measures] for our country,” the official said.
Experts in the region said that Beijing’s intensifying campaign of “mask diplomacy” to reverse the damage to its reputation had met with less resistance in Asia.
Why China’s ‘mask diplomacy’ is raising concern in the West
29 Mar 2020
“Over the past two months or so, China, after getting the Covid-19 outbreak under control, has been using a very concerted effort to reshape the narrative, to pre-empt the narrative that China is liable for this global pandemic, that China has to compensate other countries,” said Richard Heydarian, a Manila-based academic and former policy adviser to the Philippine government.
“It doesn’t help that the US is in lockdown with its domestic crisis and that we have someone like President Trump who is more interested in playing the blame game rather than acting like a global leader,” he said.
Shahriman Lockman, a senior analyst with the foreign policy and security studies programme at Malaysia’s Institute of Strategic and International Studies, said that as the US had withdrawn into its own affairs as it struggled to contain the pandemic, China had found Southeast Asia a fertile ground for cultivating an image of itself as a provider.
China’s first-quarter GDP shrinks for the first time since 1976 as coronavirus cripples economy
Beijing’s highly publicised delegations tasking medical equipment and supplies had burnished that reputation, he said, adding that the Chinese government had also “quite successfully shaped general Southeast Asian perceptions of its handling of the pandemic, despite growing evidence that it could have acted more swiftly at the early stages of the outbreak in Wuhan”.
“Its capacity and will to build hospitals from scratch and put hundreds of millions of people on lockdown are being compared to the more indecisive and chaotic responses seen in the West, especially in Britain and the United States,” he said.
Coronavirus droplets may travel further than personal distancing guidelines
16 Apr 2020
Lockman said Southeast Asian countries had also been careful to avoid getting caught in the middle of the deteriorating relationship between Beijing and Washington as the two powers pointed fingers at each other over the origins of the new coronavirus.
“The squabble between China and the United States about the pandemic is precisely what Asean governments would go to great lengths to avoid because it is seen as an expression of Sino-US rivalry,” he said.
“Furthermore, the immense Chinese market is seen as providing an irreplaceable route towards Southeast Asia’s post-pandemic economic recovery.”
Aaron Connelly, a research fellow in Southeast Asian political change and foreign policy with the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Singapore, said Asian countries’ dependence on China had made them slow to blame China for the pandemic.
“Anecdotally, it seems to me that most Southeast Asian political and business elites have given Beijing a pass on the initial cover-up of Covid-19, and high marks for the domestic lockdown that followed,” he said.
“This may be motivated reasoning, because these elites are so dependent on Chinese trade and investment, and see little benefit in criticising China.”
China and Vietnam ‘likely to clash again’ as they build maritime militias
12 Apr 2020
The cooperation with its neighbours as they grapple with the coronavirus had not slowed China’s military and research activities in the disputed areas of the South China Sea – a point of contention that would continue to cloud relations in the region, experts said.
Earlier this month an encounter in the South China Sea with a Chinese coastguard vessel led to the sinking of a fishing boat from Vietnam, which this year assumed chairmanship of Asean.
And in a move that could spark fresh regional concerns, shipping data on Thursday showed a controversial Chinese government survey ship, the Haiyang Dizhi 8, had moved closer to Malaysia’s exclusive economic zone.
The survey ship was embroiled in a months-long stand-off last year with Vietnamese vessels within Hanoi’s exclusive economic zone and was spotted again on Tuesday 158km (98 miles) off the Vietnamese coast.
Fu Chengyu, the former chairman of China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), says hostility towards Beijing will increase after the coronavirus
US will try to ‘thwart China’s rise’ and economic fallout from Covid-19 will be worse than the global financial crisis, says Fu
Former Sinopec chairman Fu Chengyu says China will face a more hostile world post coronavirus. Photo: EPA
The world is set to become more hostile for China after the coronavirus as the risk of “black swan” events gathers for Beijing, a heavyweight in China’s state oil industry has warned, reflecting growing wariness about the geopolitical environment among political and business elites.
Fu Chengyu, the former chairman of both China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) and Sinopec Group, painted an ominous picture of increasing antagonism from the United States and damaging unforeseen events, known as black swans, like Covid-19
at an online symposium organised by business magazine Caijing.
The US would “mercilessly” suppress China in the fields of economics, trade, finance and technology, and Washington was set on taking advantage of the coronavirus pandemic to “forge a less favourable international environment for” the nation, Fu said this week.
“We’ve smelled the odours and new plots against China are in formation,” he said.
After the epidemic, the external environment for our survival will be more severe – Fu Chengyu
“After the epidemic, the external environment for our survival will be more severe … we must prepare for the worst and do our best to achieve the best possible results.”
While Fu has retired from his posts at state companies, he is an influential voice in
with decades of experience and contacts in the US petroleum sector.
Fu was a counterpart of Rex Tillerson, who was chairman of ExxonMobil from 2006 to 2017, and served as US State Secretary under President Donald Trump until March 2018.
While at the helm of CNOOC in the early 2000s, he felt political heat from Washington over a US$18.5 billion takeover bid for the American oil company Unocal in 2005, which the company was subsequently forced to withdraw.
China says no evidence to suggest coronavirus virus came from Wuhan’s lab
Speaking at the event in Beijing, Fu said that the coronavirus, which has heightened tensions between Beijing and Washington, will have impacts on global value chains and the world trade landscape for years to come.
“The crisis stemming from the coronavirus pandemic won’t be over in just one or two years … the impact will last longer than the 2008 global financial crisis,” he said.
He added that China would face numerous “black swan” risks in the future.
President Xi Jinping warned in 2019 that China must be on guard for black swan risks as well as “grey rhino” events, referring to an obvious threat that is often neglected.
Geopolitics is getting worse and worse, and we need to be very careful. The US will try various ways to thwart China’s rise, and energy is an important area
To respond to the economic fallout from the coronavirus, China must do more to create a self-sustaining domestic economy, Fu said, and in particular reduce input prices for gas and electricity and boost public services such as health care and education.
“Geopolitics is getting worse and worse, and we need to be very careful,” Fu said. “The US will try various ways to thwart China’s rise, and energy is an important area.”
The US could potentially form a new oil export alliance with Saudi Arabia and Russia to make it possible to cut oil supplies to China, he said.
“China must be prepared for such a scenario, and even when supplies are cut off, we can have some basic self-protection.”
China’s economy shrank for the first time in decades in the first quarter of the year, as the virus forced factories and businesses to close.
The world’s second biggest economy contracted 6.8% according to official data released on Friday.
The financial toll the coronavirus is having on the Chinese economy will be a huge concern to other countries.
China is an economic powerhouse as a major consumer and producer of goods and services.
This is the first time China has seen its economy shrink in the first three months of the year since it started recording quarterly figures in 1992.
“The GDP contraction in January-March will translate into permanent income losses, reflected in bankruptcies across small companies and job losses,” said Yue Su at the Economist Intelligence Unit.
Last year, China saw healthy economic growth of 6.4% in the first quarter, a period when it was locked in a trade war with the US.
In the last two decades, China has seen average economic growth of around 9% a year, although experts have regularly questioned the accuracy of its economic data.
Its economy had ground to a halt during the first three months of the year as it introduced large-scale shutdowns and quarantines to prevent the virus spread in late January.
As a result, economists had expected bleak figures, but the official data comes in slightly worse than expected.
Among other key figures released in Friday’s report:
Factory output was down 1.1% for March as China slowly starts manufacturing again.
Retail sales plummeted 15.8% last month as many of shoppers stayed at home.
Unemployment hit 5.9% in March, slightly better than February’s all-time high of 6.2%.
Analysis: A 6% expansion wiped out
Robin Brant, BBC News, Shanghai
The huge decline shows the profound impact that the virus outbreak, and the government’s draconian reaction to it, had on the world’s second largest economy. It wipes out the 6% expansion in China’s economy recorded in the last set of figures at the end of last year.
Beijing has signalled a significant economic stimulus is on the way as it tries to stabilise its economy and recover. Earlier this week the official mouthpiece of the ruling Communist Party, the People’s Daily, reported it would “expand domestic demand”.
But the slowdown in the rest of the global economy presents a significant problem as exports still play a major role in China’s economy. If it comes this will not be a quick recovery.
On Thursday the International Monetary Fund forecast China’s economy would avoid a recession but grow by just 1.2% this year. Job figures released recently showed the official government unemployment figure had risen sharply, with the number working in companies linked to export trade falling the most.
China has unveiled a range of financial support measures to cushion the impact of the slowdown, but not on the same scale as other major economies.
“We don’t expect large stimulus, given that that remains unpopular in Beijing. Instead, we think policymakers will accept low growth this year, given the prospects for a better 2021,” said Louis Kuijs, an analyst with Oxford Economics.
Since March, China has slowly started letting factories resume production and letting businesses reopen, but this is a gradual process to return to pre-lockdown levels.
Media caption Why does China’s economy matter to you?
China relies heavily on its factories and manufacturing plants for economic growth, and has been dubbed “the world’s factory”.
Stock markets in the region showed mixed reaction to the Chinese economic data, with China’s benchmark Shanghai Composite index up 0.9%.
Photo taken on April 14, 2020 shows containers at the Lianyungang Port in Lianyungang City, east China’s Jiangsu Province. China’s foreign trade showed signs of stabilizing in March with export and import both beating bearish market expectations, official data showed Tuesday. (Photo by Geng Yuhe/Xinhua)
China’s famed Yiwu International Trade Market, a barometer for the health of the nation’s exports, has been hammered by the economic fallout from Covid-19
Export orders have dried up amid sweeping containment measures in the US and Europe and restrictions on foreigners entering China have shut out international buyers
The coronavirus pandemic has severely dented wholesale trade at the Yiwu International Trade Market in China. Photo: SCMP
The Yiwu International Trade Market has always been renowned as a window into the vitality of Chinese manufacturing, crammed with stalls showcasing everything from flashlights to machine parts.
But today, as the coronavirus pandemic rips through the global economy, it offers a strikingly different picture – the dismal effect Covid-19 is having on the nation’s exports.
The usually bustling wholesale market, home to some 70,000 vendors supplying 1,700 different types of manufactured goods, is a shadow of its former self.
Only a handful of foreign buyers traipse through aisles of the sprawling 4-million-square-metre (43 million square feet) complex, while store owners – with no customers to tend to – sit hunched over their phones or talking in small groups.
A foreign buyer visits a stall selling face masks. Photo: Ren Wei
“We try to convince ourselves that the deep slump will not last long,” said the owner of Wetell Razor, Tong Ciying, at her empty store. “We cannot let complacency creep in, although the coronavirus has sharply hampered exports of Chinese products.”
Chinese exports plunged by 17.2 per cent in January and February combined compared to the same period a year earlier, according to the General Administration of Customs. The figure was a sharp drop from 7.9 per cent growth in December.
After riding out a supply shock that shut down most of its factories, China is now facing a second wave demand shock, as overseas export orders vanish amid sweeping containment measures to contain the outbreak around the globe.
Nowhere is that clearer to see than in Yiwu. The city of 1.2 million, which lies in the prosperous coastal province of Zhejiang, was catapulted into the international limelight as a showroom for Chinese manufacturing when the country joined the World Trade Organisation in 2001.
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Before the pandemic, thousands of foreign buyers would flock to the mammoth trade market each day to source all manner of products before sending them home.
But the outbreak, which has claimed the lives of more than 113,000 people and infected more than 1.9 million around the world, is proving a major test for the market and the health of the trade dependent city.
Imports and exports via Yiwu last year were valued at 296.7 billion yuan (US$42.2 billion) – nearly double the city’s economic output.
Businesses, however, are facing a very different picture in 2020. Most traders at the market say they have lost at least half their business amid the pandemic, which was first detected in the central Chinese city of Wuhan last year.
Just take a look at the situation in Yiwu and you will understand the extent of the virus’ effect on China’s trade with foreign countries – Tianqing
“Yiwu is the barometer for China’s exports,” said Jiang Tianqing, the owner of Beauty Shine Industry, a manufacturer of hair brushes. “Just take a look at the situation in Yiwu and you will understand the extent of the virus’ effect on China’s trade with foreign countries.”
Jiang said his business was only just hanging on thanks to a handful of loyal customers placing orders via WeChat.
“I assume it will be a drawn-out battle against the coronavirus,” he said. “We are aware of the fact that developed economies like the US and Europe have been severely affected.”
The Yiwu market reopened on February 18 after a one-month long hiatus following the Lunar New Year holiday and the government’s order to halt commercial activities to contain the spread of the outbreak.
Jiang Tianqing, owner of hair brush company Beauty Shine Industry. Photo: Ren Wei
But facing the threat of a spike in imported cases, Beijing banned foreigners from entering the country in late March – shutting out potential overseas buyers.
Despite the lack of business, local authorities have urged stall owners to keep their spaces open to display Yiwu’s pro-business attitude, owners said.
“For those bosses who just set up their shops here, it would be a do-or-die moment now since their revenue over the next few months will probably be zero,” said Tong. “I am lucky that my old customers are still making orders for my razors.”
The impact of the coronavirus is just the latest challenge for local merchants, who normally pay 200,000 yuan (US$28,000) per year for a 10-square-metre (108 square feet) stall at the market.
Traders were hard hit by the trade war between China and the United States when the Trump administration imposed a 25 per cent tariff on US$200 billion of Chinese imports last year.
At the time, some Chinese companies agreed to slash their prices to help American buyers digest the additional costs.
“But it is different this time,” said Jiang. “Pricing does not matter. Both buyers and sellers are eager to seal deals, but we are not able to overcome the barriers [to demand caused by the virus].”
Ma Jun, a manager with a LED light bulb trading company, said the only export destination for her company’s products was war-torn Yemen because it was the only country with ports still open.
It is a public health crisis that ravages not just our businesses, but the whole world economy – Dong Xin
Dong Xin, an entrepreneur selling stationery products, said he could not ship the few orders he had because “ocean carriers have stopped operations”.
“It is a public health crisis that ravages not just our businesses, but the whole world economy,” he said. “The only thing can do is to pray for an early end to the pandemic.”
Most wholesale traders in the Yiwu market run manufacturing businesses based outside the city, so a sharp fall in sales has a ripple effect on their factories, potentially resulting in massive job cuts.
Workers pack containers at Yiwu Port, an inland port home to dozens of warehouses. Photo: Ren Wei
At Yiwu Port, an inland logistics hub full of warehouses where goods from the factories are unpacked and repacked for shipping abroad, container truck drivers joke about their job prospects.
“We used to commute between Shaoxing and here five times a week, and now it is down to twice a week,” said a driver surnamed Wang, describing the trip from his home to the shipping port, just over 100km away.
“At the end of the day, we may not be infected with the coronavirus, but our jobs will still be part of the cost of the fight against it.”
Between January 20 and April 4, PM2.5 levels across the country fell by more than 18 per cent, according to the environment ministry
But observers say that as soon as the nation’s factories and roads get back to normal, so too will the air pollution levels
Blue skies were an unexpected upside of locking down cities and halting industrial production across China. Photo: AFP
China’s air quality has improved dramatically in recent weeks as a result of the widespread city lockdowns and strict travel restrictions introduced to contain the
. But experts say the blue skies could rapidly disappear as factories and roads reopen under a government stimulus plan to breathe new life into a stalled economy.
According to the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, between January 20 and April 4 the average concentration of PM2.5 – the tiny particles that pose the biggest risk to health – fell by 18.4 per cent from the same period of last year.
Meanwhile, the average number of days with good air quality – determined as when the air pollution index falls below 100 – rose by 7.5 per cent, it said.
Satellite images released by Nasa and the European Space Agency showed a dramatic drop in nitrogen dioxide emissions in major Chinese cities in the first two months of 2020, compared with a year earlier.
According to Nasa, the changes in Wuhan – the central China city at the epicentre of the initial coronavirus outbreak – were particularly striking, while nitrogen dioxide levels across the whole of eastern and central China were 10 to 30 per cent lower than normal.
The region is home to hundreds of factories, supplying everything from steel and car parts to microchips. Wuhan, which has a population of 11 million, was placed under lockdown on January 23, but those restrictions were lifted on Wednesday
.
Air pollution is likely to return to China’s cities once the lockdowns are lifted. Photo: Reuters
Nitrogen dioxide is produced by cars, power plants and other industrial facilities and is thought to exacerbate respiratory illnesses such as asthma.
The space agency said the decline in air pollution levels coincided with the restrictions imposed on transport and business activities.
That was consistent with official data from China’s National Development and Reform Commission, which recorded a 25 per cent fall in road freight volume and a 14 per cent decline in the consumption of oil products between January and February.
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Liu Qian, a senior climate campaigner for Greenpeace based in Beijing, said the restrictions on industry and travel were the primary reasons for the improvement in air quality.
According to official data, in February, the concentrations of PM2.5, nitrogen dioxide and sulphur dioxide – a toxic gas that comes mostly from industrial burning of coal and other fossil fuels – all fell, by 27 per cent, 28 per cent and 23 per cent, respectively.
“The causes of air pollution are complicated, but the suspension of industrial activity and a drop in public transport use will have helped to reduce levels,” Liu said.
As the epicentre of the Covid-19 pandemic has shifted to the United States and
, human and industrial activity in China is gradually picking back up, and so is air pollution.
Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst with the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air in Helsinki, said that levels of nitrogen dioxide pollution, measured both by Nasa satellites and official stations in China, started inching back up in the middle of March and had returned to normal levels by the end of the month.
That coincided with the centre’s findings – published on Carbon Brief, a British website on climate change – that coal consumption at power plants and oil refineries across China returned to their normal levels in the fourth week of March.
How the Wuhan experience could help coronavirus battle in US and Europe
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Ma Jun, director of the Institute of Public & Environmental Affairs, a Beijing-based charity, said a stimulus plan to kick-start the economy would have a significant impact on air pollution.
“Once industrial production is fully resumed, so are the emission levels,” he said. “Unless another outbreak happens and triggers another lockdown, which would be terrible, the improvement achieved under the pandemic is unstable and won’t last long.”
After the 2008 financial crisis, Beijing launched a 4 trillion yuan (US$567.6 billion) stimulus package that included massive infrastructure investment, but also did huge damage to the environment. In the years that followed, air pollution rose to record highs and sparked a public backlash.
Even before the Covid-19 outbreak, China’s economy was slowing – it grew by 6.1 per cent in 2019, its slowest for 29 years – and concerns are now growing that policymakers will go all out to revive it.
“Local governments have been under huge pressure since last year, and there are fears that environmental regulations will be sidelined [in the push to boost economic output],” Ma said.
But Beijing had the opportunity to get it right this time by investing more in green infrastructure projects rather than high-carbon projects, he said.
“A balance between economic development and environmental protection is key to achieving a green recovery, and that is what China needs.”
Malfunction happened during third stage of launch after earlier stages were completed successfully, state media says
Failed mission is second in less than a month after Long March-7A encountered problems after lift-off on March 16
A Long March-3B carrier rocket blasts off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre in Sichuan province in November. A similar launch on Thursday ended in failure. Photo: Xinhua
China’s space programme suffered another setback on Thursday night with its second rocket launch failure in less than a month.
Officials are investigating what caused a malfunction during the third stage of the Long March-3B launch after lift-off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre in southwest Sichuan province at 7.46pm with an Indonesian Palapa-N1 satellite, Xinhua reported.
“The first and second stages of the rocket performed well, but the third stage malfunctioned,” the report said.
“Debris from the third stage of the rocket and the satellite fell [to the ground]. The launch mission failed.”
Debris from the failed mission rained down over Guam on Thursday night. Photo: Twitter
China’s state media did not say where the rocket landed, but the office of Guam Homeland Security and Civil Defence said “a fiery object over the Marianas sky” observed on Thursday evening was likely connected to the failed launch.
Video footage of the burning debris falling from the sky was widely circulated on social media.
The setback follows another failed launch on March 16, when China’s new Long March-7A, a three-stage, medium-lift, liquid-fuel rocket, encountered an “abnormality” minutes after lifting off from its launch site in the southern island province of Hainan.
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The satellite lost on Thursday – the Nusantara 2 – was built in China for Indonesian telecommunication companies Pasifik Satelit Nusantara and Indosat Ooredoo. It was intended to replace an older satellite to provide internet and broadcasting services in Indonesia and across the Asia-Pacific region to Australia, The Jakarta Post reported earlier this month.
It is not known if the failed launch will have an impact on other Long March-3B satellite launches planned for later in the year.
Introduced in 1996, the Long March-3B – also known as the CZ-3B or LM-3B – has been the main orbital carrier rocket of China’s space programme. It was used to carry many of the satellites that make up China’s BeiDou navigation system, with the latest addition being in March.
For that launch, engineers used parachutes to control where the rocket’s boosters would land after being discarded after lift-off so as to minimise the impact on people living below, state media reported.
The latest version of the Long March-3B entered service in 2007 and is dedicated to launching heavy communications satellites of up to 5.5 tonnes into geostationary transfer orbits.
Photo taken on April 14, 2020 shows containers at the Lianyungang Port in Lianyungang City, east China’s Jiangsu Province. China’s foreign trade showed signs of stabilizing in March with export and import both beating bearish market expectations, official data showed Tuesday. (Photo by Geng Yuhe/Xinhua)
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 