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.
Inmates who have undergone compulsory re-education programme to be moved to other parts of China under job placement scheme delayed by Covid-19 outbreak
Critics have said the camps are a move to eradicate cultural and religious identity but Beijing has defended them as way of boosting job opportunities and combating Islamic radicalisation
Illustration by Perry Tse
The Chinese government has resumed a job placement scheme for tens of thousands of Uygur Muslims who have completed compulsory programmes at the “re-education” camps in the far-western region of Xinjiang, sources said.
The plan, which includes a quota for the numbers provinces must take, was finalised last year but disrupted by the outbreak of Covid-19.
The delay threatens to undermine the Chinese government’s efforts to justify its use of internment camps in Xinjiang.
Critics have said these camps were part of the measures designed to eradicate the ethnic and cultural identity of Uygurs and other Muslim minorities and that participants had no choice but to undertake the re-education programme.
Beijing has repeatedly dismissed these criticisms and said the camps are to give Uygurs the training they need to find better jobs and stay away from the influence of radical fundamentalism.
First Xinjiang, now Tibet passes rules to promote ‘ethnic unity’
17 Feb 2020
Now with the disease under control, the Chinese government has resumed the job placement deal for other provinces to absorb Xinjiang labourers, sources said.
Despite the devastating impact of the disease on its economy and job markets, the Chinese authorities are determined to go ahead with the plan, which they believe would
“Excellent graduates were to be taken on as labourers by various inland governments, in particular, 19 provinces and municipalities,” said the source. It is unclear what constitutes “excellent graduates”.
Some sources earlier said that the programme may be scaled back in light of the new economic reality and uncertainties.
But a Beijing-based source said the overall targets would remain unchanged.
“The unemployment problem in Xinjiang must be resolved at all costs, despite the outbreak,” the source said.
The South China Morning Post has learned that at least 19 provinces and cities have been given quotas to hire Muslim minorities, mostly Uygurs, who have “graduated” from re-education camps.
As early as February, when the daily number of infections started to come down outside Hubei province, China already begun to send Uygur workers to their new jobs.
A photo taken in February showed thousands of young Uygurs, all wearing face masks and with huge red silk flowers pinned to their chests, being dispatched to work in factories outside their hometowns.
By the end of February, Xinjiang alone has created jobs for more than 60,000 Uygur graduates from the camps. A few thousand were also sent to work in other provinces.
Many have been employed in factories making toys and clothes.
Xinjiang’s new rules against domestic violence expand China’s ‘extremism’ front to the home
7 Apr 2020
Sources told the Post that the southern city of Shenzhen – China’s hi-tech manufacturing centre – was given a target last year to eventually resettle 50,000 Uygurs. The city is allowed to do this in several batches, with 15,000 to 20,000 planned for the first stage.
In Fujian province, a government source also said they had been told to hire “tens of thousands of Xinjiang workers”.
“I heard the first batch of several thousands would arrive soon. We have already received official directives asking us to handle their settlement with care,” said the source.
He said the preparation work includes providing halal food to the workers as well as putting in place stronger security measures to “minimise the risks of mass incidents”. It is not known whether they will be given access to prayer rooms.
There are no official statistics of how many Uygurs will be resettled to other provinces and the matter is rarely reported by the mainland media.
But in March, Anhui Daily, the province’s official newspaper, reported that it had received 1,560 “organised labourers from Xinjiang”.
The Uygur workers on average could earn between 1,200 yuan (US$170) to 4,000 yuan (US$565) a month, with accommodation and meals provided by the local authorities, according to Chinese media reports.
However, they are not allowed to leave their dormitories without permission.
The UN has estimated that up to a million Muslims were being held in the camps. Photo: AP
Xinjiang’s per capita disposable income in 2018 was 1,791 yuan a month, according to state news agency Xinhua. But the salary level outside the region’s biggest cities such as Urumqi may be much lower.
The official unemployment rate for the region is between 3 and 4 per cent, but the statistics do not include those living in remote rural areas.
Mindful of the potential risks of the resettlement, Beijing has taken painstaking efforts to carefully manage everything – from recruitment to setting contract terms to managing the workers’ day-to-day lives.
Local officials will go to each Uygur workers’ home to personally take them to prearranged flights and trains. On arrival, they will be immediately picked up and sent to their assigned factories.
US bill would bar goods from Xinjiang, classifying them the product of forced labour by Uygurs
12 Mar 2020
Such arrangements are not unique to Uygurs and local governments have made similar arrangements for ethnic Han workers in other parts of China.
After screening them for Covid-19, local governments have arranged for workers to be sent to their workplaces in batches. They are checked again on arrival, before being sent to work.
China is accelerating such placement deals on a massive scale to offset the impact of the economic slowdown after the outbreak.
Sources told the South China Morning Post that the job placement deal was first finalised by governments in Xinjiang and other provinces last year.
The aim is to guarantee jobs for Uygur Muslim who have “completed vocational training” at the re-education camps and meet poverty alleviation deals in the region, one of the poorest parts of China.
The training they receive in the camps includes vocational training for various job types such as factory work, mechanical maintenance and hotel room servicing. They also have to study Mandarin, Chinese law, core party values and patriotic education.
Xinjiang’s massive internment camps have drawn widespread international condemnation.
The United Nations has estimated that up to 1 million Uygur and other Muslim minority citizens are being arbitrarily detained in the camps, which Beijing insists are necessary to combat terrorism and Islamic radicalisation.
Late last year, Xinjiang’s officials announced that all the inmates of these so-called vocational training centres had “graduated” and taken up employment.
Before this labour placement scheme was introduced, it was extremely difficult for Uygurs to find jobs or live and work in inland regions.
Muslim ethnic minorities, Uygurs in particular, have been subjected to blatant discrimination in China and the situation worsened after the 2009 clashes.
Earlier this month, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute released a report saying more than 80,000 Uygurs had been moved from Xinjiang to work in factories in nine Chinese regions and provinces.
It identified a total of 27 factories that supplied 83 brands, including household names such as Google, Apple, Microsoft, Mitsubishi, Siemens, Sony, Huawei, Samsung, Nike, Abercrombie and Fitch, Uniqlo, Adidas and Lacoste.
‘Psychological torture’: Uygurs abroad face mental health crisis over plight of relatives who remain in Xinjiang
11 Mar 2020
The security think tank concluded that the Chinese government had transferred Uygur workers “under conditions that strongly suggest forced labour” between 2017 and 2019, sometimes drawing labourers directly from re-education camps.
The report also said the work programme represents a “new phase in China’s social re-engineering campaign targeting minority citizens”.
Workers were typically sent to live in segregated dormitories, underwent organised Mandarin lessons and ideological training outside working hours and were subject to constant surveillance, the researcher found.
They were also forbidden from taking part in religious observances, according to the report that is based on open-source documents, satellite pictures, academic research and on-the-ground reporting.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian criticised the report saying it had “no factual basis”.
GUBEI WATER TOWN, China (Reuters) – The mock Qing dynasty village nestled below the Great Wall would normally be teeming with tourists on Labour Day, but the thin crowds on Friday showed that while China’s coronavirus epidemic has subsided, people’s fears could take longer to fade.
During holidays, some 100,000 visitors a day would traipse round the quaint stone-paved streets of Gubei Water Town, 110 kilometres (68 miles) northeast of Beijing. Its marketing manager reckoned on getting just a tenth of that number this year.
“People have concerns about the virus and are unwilling to travel long distances,” said Guo Baorong. For a start, there will be no international tourists this time, he said, noting foreigners would normally make up around 15% of visitors.
About 70% of China’s tourist attractions had reopened as of Thursday, according to China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism, but all sites have had to cap visitors to 30% of designed capacity.
More sites, including the Forbidden City in Beijing, were set to reopen Friday.
Staff at the entrance to Gubei Water Town checked visitors’ temperatures and health tracking codes. And inside, lines on the ground directed tourists to stand one meter apart and stores used ropes to keep crowds from forming. Like everywhere in China since the lockdowns were imposed to stem the epidemic, everyone wore masks.
Still, in places where tourists squeezed together as the streets narrowed, staff shouted at them to spread out.
Some tourists enjoyed the smaller crowds.
Xiao Chen, a 24-year-old student wearing traditional Chinese garb known as “Hanfu” came to Gubei to take pictures around ancient architecture.
“It’s good to come out of the city. There was barely anyone in Gubei Water Town yesterday, and even today, it’s not crowded,” she said.
The tranquility may not last. Room bookings jumped on Thursday after Beijing and nearby areas began easing coronavirus restrictions, with about 90% of accommodation now reserved.
“We were not expecting that many people to come in,” said Guo.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption India’s railways are hoping to ease the burden on hospitals
India is preparing for a potential surge in Covid-19 patients by tapping into an unusual resource: its trains, which power the world’s fourth biggest rail network.
The country suspended its passenger trains for the first time after it announced a three-week lockdown on 25 March to contain the coronavirus. As of Wednesday, it had reported 4,643 active cases and 149 deaths, and the numbers are rapidly increasing.
“We, at the railways, thought: how can we contribute?” its spokesman, Rajesh Bajpai, told the BBC. “So we came up with this idea and everyone liked it.”
Work has already begun to convert 5,000 train coaches into quarantine or isolation wards, which amounts to 40,000 beds. And the railway ministry says it’s prepared to convert 15,000 more coaches.
The Indian railways – as the ministry is known – is a behemoth. Largely constructed during British rule, it’s still the mainstay of India’s public transport, and includes some of the world’s busiest urban rail systems. It transports 23 million passengers a day and its 12,000 trains crisscross 65,000km (40,389 miles) of tracks, connecting the remotest parts of India.
Mr Bajpai says the coaches can be spared as they are mostly trying to convert older ones, and passengers will be fewer than ever in the coming months even if restrictions are eased.
He adds that this is not unusual for the railways, which already runs several “special” trains, from luxury trains to exhibition trains to a hospital train, complete with operation theatres.
“The coach is a shell and inside, you can provide anything – a drawing room, a dining room, a kitchen, a hospital.”
A looming crisis?
And India may well need the extra beds.
States have already turned all sorts of spaces – sports centres, stadiums, wedding venues, hotels, resorts – into quarantine or isolation centres. But officials fear they will run out of space as the country ramps up testing.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption India suspended all passenger trains last month
For every person who tests positive, there are scores more who need to be traced, quarantined and, if necessary, isolated. But isolation at home is not always an option in India’s joint family households – and especially not in its densely-populated slums.
“There are so many options available and this [the coaches] is one of the options,” Mr Bajpai says.
He doesn’t foresee them being used until beds in existing quarantine or isolation centres are filled. But, he adds, they will keep them ready with the necessary facilities.
That includes converting one of the two toilets in each coach into a “bathing room”, providing oxygen cylinders in every coach, and modifying all the cabins so they can hold medical equipment. And then there are measures that are specific to Covid-19 – such as replacing taps that turn with those that have long handles, and fitting dustbins with foot pedals.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption It takes up to three days to turn a coach into an isolation ward
The ministry has also ordered extra coat hooks and mosquito nets for every cabin, and has instructed officials to make sure that charging points are working, the upholstery “is in good condition” and “broken panels are replaced”.
The coaches are being readied in 130 different locations across the country, but it’s yet to be decided where they will be stationed.
Mr Bajpai says it’s up to states to decide which stations they want the coaches in. But that in itself is a process because the coaches need regular water and electric supply.
And there are other concerns too. Summer has begun and large parts of India record scorching temperatures, often more than 40C. And the coaches that are being converted are not air-conditioned.
“The patient will be very uncomfortable. Doctors and nurses will be wearing protective gear, and they will find it very difficult,” says Vivek Sahai, a former chairman of the railway board.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption Staff member of Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) prepare train coaches to convert them into isolation wards for COVID-19 patients.
He also says not everyone might be comfortable squatting to use Indian-style toilets; and he wonders if all the designated coaches have a proper system of waste management. (Indian coaches are designed to dispose of human waste onto the tracks although new technologies have begun to be adopted in recent years.)
“I am not saying it cannot be done but they have to take care of these things,” he says. “But if anybody can do it, it’s the railways.”
However, some experts say that this by itself is not going to help solve India’s problems.
“You don’t just need space,” says Dr Sumit Sengupta, a pulmonologist. “We need thousands of doctors and nurses if you really have to make a dent.”
India is severely short of both, and at least three hospitals have been sealed this week alone after members of the staff tested positive.
Media caption As cases of coronavirus rise and the virus hits India’s congested slums, will the country cope?
“Why isolate someone who has symptoms when there is no treatment? Because you don’t want them to spread the infection,” Dr Sengupta says.
But, he adds, the virus is spreading anyway because so many patients are asymptomatic. He says isolating symptomatic patients will not help unless India starts testing aggressively.
“This will work only as part of a larger strategy,” he adds. “Test, trace and isolate. Test should come first.”
Image copyright MAJORITY WORLDImage caption Indian doctors have been working extra hours to halt the spread of the coronavirus
Several healthcare workers in India have been attacked as they battle to stop the spread of the coronavirus.
Reports say doctors have been spat at and chased away from homes, and that in one case patients directed abusive and vulgar language towards female nurses.
Some physicians and their families have also been ostracised by their neighbours because of their exposure to patients infected with Covid-19.
India has reported more than 2,300 cases and at least 50 people have died.
One video, which has gone viral, showed a mob throwing stones at two female doctors wearing personal protective equipment in the central city of Indore.
The doctors had gone to a densely-populated area to check on a woman suspected of having Covid-19 when they came under attack.
Despite being injured, one of the doctors seen in the video, Zakiya Sayed, said the incident “won’t deter me from doing my duty”.
“We were on our usual round to screen suspected cases,” she told the BBC. “We never thought that we would be attacked.”
“I had never seen scenes like that. It was frightening. We somehow fled from the mob. I am injured but not scared at all.”
Dr Sayed added: “We had no reason to suspect that people would be agitated against medical teams.”
“We are working to keep people safe. We had information about a person coming in contact with a Covid-19 patient. We were talking to the person when residents got agitated and attacked us.”
Image copyright HINDUSTAN TIMESImage caption Doctors have been abused and attacked in different parts of India
Seven people have been arrested in connection with the incident.
Dr Anand Rai, who is also a part of the Covid-19 taskforce in Indore, told the BBC: “Nothing can justify the attack against medical team. But it happened in a Muslim-dominated area where there is general distrust against the government.”
“So that anger spilled over and took the form of this attack. But whatever maybe the reason, nothing can justify violence, especially against doctors during a national health emergency,” he added.
Thousands who attended the gathering in Delhi, organised by Islamic preaching group Tablighi Jamaat, have been put in quarantine, and authorities are still tracing others. It is believed that the infections were caused by preachers who attended the event from Indonesia.
At the Ghaziabad hospital, some of the quarantined attendees allegedly used abusive and vulgar language against members of staff.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption Almost 400 cases of Covid-19 have been traced to a Tablighi Jamaat event in Delhi
“Some were walking naked in the hospital ward and harassing women doctors and nurses,” a doctor who works at the hospital told the BBC. “They kept asking for cigarettes and tobacco.”
A senior police officer in the city told the BBC that cases had been registered against some people after doctors filed a complaint.
“Registering cases was the last resort. Police are still trying to make them understand the severity of the situation,” he said.
Image copyright SOPA IMAGESImage caption Doctors and nurses have asked people to follow their advice and not panic
Similar incidents have been reported in neighbouring Delhi.
Some attendees of the Tablighi Jamaat event who are being held in a quarantine facility run by the railways are said to have spat at doctors and misbehaved.
Deepak Kumar, spokesman for Northern Railways, said the situation there was now under control.
“The attendees have been counselled and they are now co-operating with the staff,” he said.
Delhi’s state government has reportedly written to the police, requesting more security for medical staff.
Reports of attacks on doctors and nurses have also come from the southern city of Hyderabad and the western city of Surat.
A doctor who was treating coronavirus patients is Hyderabad’s Gandhi Hospital was attacked on Wednesday.
Police have promised the doctor that “strict action will be taken against the culprits”.
Image copyright NARINDER NANUImage caption Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said that doctors are “front-line soldiers”
But it is not just a work where medical workers are facing discrimination. It has followed them home.
One doctor, who did not wish to be identified, said she felt “extremely disheartened when I learnt that even my neighbours think that me and my family shouldn’t be allowed to live in the building”.
“We want our families to be safe. But we are being discriminated for doing our job.”
“A number of doctors have tested positive across India and that shows how tough our job is at the moment. And that is why we need everybody’s support to win this war against coronavirus.”
She added: “We are following all safety protocols. We are not meeting even our families and that is stressful.”
“But seeing this open discrimination just breaks my heart. But we will go on because there is really no other option.”
When Kazakh actress Reyizha Alimjan arrived in Shanghai last month wearing jeans and a camisole it reignited a long-running debate over who gets a say on how Chinese women should dress
Fashion choices that would be regarded as unremarkable in Europe or North America are often seen as outrageous in the world’s most populous nation
Kazakh actress Reyizha Alimjan’s fashion choices sparked a social media storm in China last month. Photo: Weibo
When Li Xiang broke up with her boyfriend over a selfie she posted on social media, it was not just about a woman letting a man know he wasn’t entitled to tell her how to dress in public, but a matter of personal freedom, social norms and cultural tradition.
A few weeks ago, the 24-year-old media worker from Shanghai shared a photo on WeChat that showed her posing at her bedroom door in a camisole and mini shorts. Her boyfriend said it made him very “uncomfortable”, and they quarrelled.
“‘Look how scantily clad you are, and [if] that is not enough, you shared it online,’ he said,” Li recalled.
“I got mad when he said, ‘You should go and ask other men if they’d like their girlfriends to dress like that’, as if he should decide what I wear – as if I were his appendage,” she said, referring to the archaic notion that a woman is secondary to a man in their relationship.
What clothes Chinese women should or should not wear has been the subject of intense online debate in recent weeks. Photo: EPA
Their argument was not unusual in China, especially over the past month when the online world became embroiled in a war of words about women’s freedom to dress as they please.
The controversy erupted when an article defending Reyizha Alimjan – the Kazakh actress criticised for showing too much flesh when she arrived at an airport in Shanghai in late July wearing jeans and a camisole – appeared on a WeChat movie review account called Staff of the 3rd Hall on August 12.
Reyizha Alimjan was criticised for her outfit on Chinese social media. Photo: Weibo
While that perspective was supported by many women online, others disagreed and said that society was open and tolerant but that people had the right to disagree.
By coincidence, a poll about women wearing camisoles in public was launched on August 10 by a WeChat account called Cicada Creativity. About 70 per cent of the nearly 14,000 respondents said they did not dare to do so.
More than 40 per cent avoided doing so for reasons such as thinking they were “not thin enough”, but a quarter said they said no because either their boyfriends disapproved or would not allow it, or they feared they would be harassed.
Chinese women spurn Victoria’s Secret for home-grown lingerie brands
Joy Lin, a feminist from Shanghai, said the debate was so fierce because it was not just about dress.
“It’s more about people’s judgment about one’s character and morals behind what she wears,” Lin said. “If you wear revealing clothes, they would say you are asking for harassment. If you show a little skin, you are frigid. And if you are casual, they call you ‘dama’ [Chinese slang, often derogatory, for middle-aged and elderly women].”
Some women say they are often judged by the clothes they wear. Photo: AP
In her experience, Lin said that if she appeared on the streets of Shanghai – the most cosmopolitan city in China – without a bra, there would be judgmental looks from passers-by before she had walked 10 metres (33 feet).
In contrast, she did just that in Paris in July, and, “no one stared at me or came near me at all”.
“Usually, when it comes to comments about what we wear, they’re not about whether the dress matches the hairstyle or things like that, but about our bodies, whether we’re slim or not and stuff like that,” she said. “Some [comments] can be very malicious and insulting.”
#MeToo rally accuses Hong Kong police of sexual violence against protesters
While shaming women for their clothing choices has been an issue for many years, it reached peak public awareness in China after the #MeToo movement took off in the US.
The social media campaign went viral in 2017 when dozens of women accused American film producer Harvey Weinstein of sexual assaults over a period of nearly 30 years.
The #MeToo movement took off in the US in 2017 after dozens of women accused film producer Harvey Weinstein of sexual assault. Photo: Shutterstock
Lu Peng, a researcher from the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, said the online debate helped encapsulate conflicts between a growing desire for freedom, gender norms and generations of tradition.
“There will hardly be a consensus on such a question about whether women have the freedom to dress,” he said. “But if this discussion can make people realise that men, not just women, also face restrictions in dressing, then it’s bringing progress.”
The simplest example was to dress for the occasion, which applies to both sexes.
“We have never been free in dressing. We’re only free within a certain extent … About what to wear in public, I don’t think we should emphasise freedom only and ignore the local culture and society,” Lu said.
Keeping a low profile has long been part of the Chinese philosophy. Photo: Xinhua
In China, there is no law banning states of dress or undress in public, nor do the Han people, who make up most of the population, have religious beliefs that restrict their mode of dress. But keeping a low profile and avoiding unwanted attention has long been part of the Chinese philosophy.
“My father will also ask me not to be ‘overexposed’, because he believes it’s increasing the risk of being harassed,” Li, the Shanghai media worker, said.
“They think they mean well, but I just want to be myself. I’m not breaking any law. I want to make my own contribution in changing this culture,” she said.
Video footage of woman fishing in a miniskirt and symbol of communist youth group deemed to violate law against ‘defiling revolutionary martyrs’
The woman was filmed in a miniskirt and red scarf. Photo: Weibo
Police in southwest China have detained a woman or “defiling revolutionary martyrs”after she appeared in a video wearing “bright, revealing clothes” and a Young Pioneers’ red scarf.
Footage of the woman, surnamed Tang, showing her fishing in a muddy field in Sichuan province was posted on the video-sharing website Kuaishou.com.
In one clip – which police said attracted three million views – she was dressed in a red blouse, white miniskirt and the red scarf traditionally worn by members of the under-14s Communist group.
Police in Rong county in Sichuan said Tang had deliberately dressed in “bright, revealing clothes” to “attract eyeballs, increase fans and video views”, and wearing the red scarf with such an outfit violated the Heroes and Martyrs Protection Law, which came into effect in May last year.
“The red scarf is a symbol of the Young Pioneers of China. It represents a corner of the red flag, dyed by the blood of martyrs,” the statement said.
Chinese artist gets naked with late father’s remains but is it art?
“Tang’s action has severely defiled what the red scarf stands for: patriotic martyrs, the honour of the young pioneers, and the patriotic sentiments of the people. It has had a bad social impact.”
Police said Tang had been given 12 days’ administrative detention on March 28 and fined 1,000 yuan (US$150). A man who shot the video footage was released with a warning.
The police statement caused heated debate on the social media platform Weibo.
Some supported the police for punishing “inappropriate behaviour”, while others questioned whether they had abused their power.
Hubei province has banned female hosts from wearing revealing clothes as part of new guidelines for live-streaming broadcasts, making it the first authority in China to do so.
The provincial government in central China banned live stream broadcasters from wearing sexy costumes, lingerie, see-through dresses, skin-colour body tights or any clothes that are too revealing, state news agency Xinhua reported.
“The law may be too vague, but our standards are more detailed in terms of what to wear from bottom to top,” Xie Qiuqi, head of Gaoxin branch of the Hubei Standardisation and Quality Institution, told Hubei TV.
“Clothes showing the national flag and emblem and other unlawful content are also banned,” he said.
Under the new rules, minors are required to provide live stream platforms with an identity card, the household registration of their guardians and a signed application form before going live online by themselves.
Live-streaming platforms should install an around-the-clock system for reporting abuses and a means of shutting down accounts or online posts in 90 seconds, the latest rules said.
The new standards in Hubei followed live-streaming platform operator Wuhan Douyu Network Technology’s announcement that it had drafted broadcast rules in conjunction with research institutes and media associations including the Wuhan Software Industry Association, Wuhan University, and Wuhan New Media Industry Association.
Live streaming is hugely popular in China, helping companies to popularise their products, while individuals can earn an income with unique online offerings. These range from something as simple and innocuous as glimpses of the life of a farmer to scantily-clad women performing dance routines.
The industry has been under intense scrutiny after a string of scandals and mishaps, including minors who stripped online and the death of Wu Yongning, a “rooftopping” star who was killed in a fall from a tall building in Changsa, Hunan province, in November 2017.
In October, Yang Kaili, a 21-year-old, self-made online celebrity, was detained for five days after singing part of the national anthem in a “disrespectful” manner.
Also last year, China conducted checks on more than 5,000 live-streaming apps and shut 370 streams for illegal programming such as pornography or “content that instigates crime”, state media reported.
“Everyone had seen unhealthy, dangerous and inappropriate content in the past that may cause others to feel uneasy. We hope that through our official announcement of the policies, we can minimise or get rid of such phenomenon,” Yuan Gang, vice-president of Douyu TV, told Hubei TV.
“Where the industry is heading is what we are worried about. We want to launch these standards before 5G is rolled out,” he said.
Female live-streamers have become very high profile. By broadcasting themselves singing, dancing, applying make-up or everyday, mundane activities like eating, some hosts can make more than 100,000 yuan (US$14,300) a month from members of a mostly male Chinese audience from an estimated 456 million viewers nationwide.
With 42 million more men than women in China, according to World Bank figures from 2017, live-streaming platforms have become a major source of entertainment for single men, helping to make it a thriving business for many enterprising women who are not averse to using sex appeal to cash in on their fan following.
In November, a 19-year-old man surnamed Lee, from eastern China, was reported to have spent more than US$37,000 on a live-stream host he claimed was his girlfriend. The money included 260,000 yuan (US$3,871) drawn from his parents’ savings for a new home. Lee was diagnosed with depression.
The Hubei government’s latest policy sparked debate on Weibo, China’s microblogging service.
“This rule is controlling too much. What is considered revealing? You can set swimsuits as the standard or black robes as the standard,” one user wrote.
“All men should wear monotone Chinese tunic suits, and all women should wear qipao,” another user said.
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 
COMMENTS: