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26/03/2014

Fashion contest the focus of ‘first lady diplomacy’ during Michelle Obama’s China visit | South China Morning Post

The closely watched day spent together by the first ladies of China and the United States have sparked lively online discussions this week. Comparison of the two women kicked off the moment Peng Liyuan, the glamorous singer wife of Xi Jinping, welcomed her counterpart Michelle Obama at a Beijing high school on Friday morning.

That the two have much in common is obvious: both women, in their early 50s, are lauded for their sense of style, are highly-educated and managed successful careers before their husbands became leaders. Both are active in charity initiatives in public health, and both have daughters.

Commenting on everything from their choice of outfits to the details of their visits, the curious online public were amazed by the juxtaposition of these two women with strong personalities.

Thomas Ye, a widely followed fashion blogger on Chinese social media platforms who tweets under “Gogoboi”, graded their attire:

Chinese President Xi Jinping (C) and his wife Peng Liyuan (R) show the way to US first lady Michelle Obama (L) as they proceed to a meeting room at a guest house in Beijing on March 21, 2014. Photo: AFP

“Fashion contest first round: Michelle Obama’s casual black waistcoat, shirt and wide-legged trousers were eclipsed by a dignified Peng, exemplified by her formal navy blue suit, decorated with a red purse. Top points to Peng,” he wrote on Sina Weibo over the weekend.

The second round, however, went to Obama, who “hit back” with a joyful red dress by designer designer Naeem Khan when she showed up for a banquet at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse on Friday evening.

Several official media outlets joined the discussion.

The official China Daily said in a photo caption showing their dresses: “The first ladies of China and the US … have much in common: They are symbols of glamour in their own countries and stand uneclipsed by their more powerful husbands. They are loved by the public not because of their spouses but for who they are. Each woman has created a ‘power centre’ – a kind of soft power – from a combination of femininity and self-assertion”.

China once again embraced the idea of “first lady diplomacy” since Xi Jinping took power in 2013, in the hope of giving a soft touch to the country’s rising assertiveness. The country’s last visible “first lady” was the charismatic Wang Guangmei, wife of Liu Shaoqi, who held the presidency between 1959 and 1966.

Peng’s increasing popularity with the public – thanks to her gracious manners and elegant style gained through her years as a professional performer – raises questions about the extent of her role.

via Fashion contest the focus of ‘first lady diplomacy’ during Michelle Obama’s China visit | South China Morning Post.

Posted in China alert, Diplomacy, First Lady, Politics | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Beijing, China, Diaoyutai State Guesthouse, Michelle Obama, Peng Liyuan, United States, Wang Guangmei, Xi JinPing

26/03/2014

2nd-child policy hurts female job application – China – Chinadaily.com.cn

China has loosened its family planning policy by allowing couples to have a second child if either parent is an only child. Unfortunately, the policy has resulted in discrimination against some married women who are looking for jobs or are already employed, according to the Xinhua News agency.

Xia Fang, a Changsha local who gave birth to her first child 10 months ago, said that during job interviews she is always asked if she is an only child or if she plans to have a second child.

“I don’t plan to have a second child. But when potential employers learn that my first child is a girl, they think I’m likely to have another baby,” said Xia.

Before the second-child policy was introduced, married women with children and work experience had an advantage in the job market, but now they are being confronted with gender discrimination again, Xia added.

Female employees of child-bearing age are being affected, as well. A white collar worker surnamed Liu said she was passed over for a promotion that went to a young man, because her boss thought she might plan to have a second child.

“Women have to work harder to be given equal status in the workplace. And many face pressure from their families to have second children, which can affect their career prospects,” Liu said.

“Companies can predict the cost of a female employee’s maternity leave when they’re allowed to give birth to only one child,” said Li Bin, a professor of sociology at Zhongnan University. “But some middle and small-sized companies can’t bear the costs of two leaves in a few years.”

via 2nd-child policy hurts female job application – China – Chinadaily.com.cn.

Posted in China alert, Economics, employment, Gender issues, One-child policy | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Beijing, Changsha, China, family planning policy, Guangzhou, Home, job interviews, Liu, married women, Twitter, Xinhua News Agency

26/03/2014

Foreign Brands Shift Focus to China’s Second-Tier Cities – Businessweek

On March 15, luxury retailer Lane Crawford held a soft launch for its new store in Chengdu, a fast-growing metropolis in southwestern China. A few years ago, major fashion brands were concentrating on China’s leading first-tier cities: Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen. But today many are focusing on China’s second-tier and third-tier cities—which McKinsey Global Institute predicts will be home to 45 percent of China’s middle-class and high-income earners by 2022.

Hong Kong-based Lane Crawford is in good company in Chengdu. In 2010 the spacious Yanlord Landmark mall opened there; its current tenants include Burberry (BRBY:LN), Dior (CDI:FP), and Louis Vuitton (MC:FP). Of its 47 stores in mainland China, Louis Vuitton has already opened 36 in second-tier and third-tier cities. Tommy Hilfiger even has outlets in the western territories of Xinjiang and Tibet. Estée Lauder (EL) has more than 100 counters in more than 40 Chinese cities.

Domestic luxury brands looking to establish themselves as national chains are also focusing on second-tier cities. Guangzhou-based fashion label Nisiss, which sells breezy trousers and $900 cocktail dresses, opened two stores last year in Chengdu. This year it plans to open stores in Qingdao, Dalian, and Suzhou, among other cities.

via Foreign Brands Shift Focus to China’s Second-Tier Cities – Businessweek.

Posted in China alert, Economics, fashion, luxury brand | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Beijing, Chengdu, China, Hong Kong, Lane Crawford, Louis Vuitton, Mainland China, Shanghai, southwestern China, Tommy Hilfiger

26/03/2014

China’s Hangzhou latest city to restrict car sales | Reuters

China’s eastern city of Hangzhou will start restricting car sales from Wednesday, joining major cities, including Shanghai and Beijing, in the fight against snarling traffic and heavy smog in the world’s largest automobile market.

Cars drive on the Three Ring Road amid the heavy haze in Beijing February 26, 2014. REUTERS/Jason Lee

The Hangzhou government said on Tuesday the curbs would take effect while it canvassed public opinion on details of the move.

It is proposing limiting sales to 80,000 units every 12 months, to be split evenly over that period, the government said on the city’s official website (www.hangzhou.gov.cn).

A final decision on details of the curbs will be released at the end of April, the government added.

China’s leaders have declared a “war” on pollution, as they seeks to calm public ire over water, air and soil pollution that often reaches levels experts consider hazardous.

This has seen an increasing number of Chinese cities limit sales of gasoline vehicles, a key contributor to air pollution.

The trend is pushing carmakers to shift their focus towards smaller cities and speed the development of electric vehicles, which are free from similar curbs.

The Hangzhou government said the decision aimed to tackle both pollution and traffic jams.

via China’s Hangzhou latest city to restrict car sales | Reuters.

Posted in car, carbon emission, China alert, Economics, greenhouse gas, Pollution, Transport | 5 Comments »

Tags: Beijing, car sales, China, Hangzhou, List of cities in the People's Republic of China, north China China, pollution, Shanghai, Traffic congestion

25/03/2014

Why China’s Manufacturing Sector Has Hit a Wall – Businessweek

More bad economic news out of China: A key indicator released on March 24 showed that the manufacturing sector of the world’s second-largest economy contracted for the fifth straight month.

The HSBC and Markit purchasing managers’ index fell to 48.1 in March, below the 48.7 expected by analysts in a Bloomberg News survey (a number above 50 indicates growth). “The weakness appears even more pronounced given that there is usually a seasonal rebound after the Chinese New Year holiday,” said Julian Evans-Pritchard, China economist at London-based Capital Economics, in a March 24 note.

The lackluster showing of the so-called Flash PMI (usually based on results from 85 percent to 90 percent of companies surveyed; the final reading will be released April 1) follows weak investment, industrial production, and export numbers in the first two months. “The old growth engine is losing steam,” Chen Xingdong, chief China economist at BNP Paribas in Beijing, told Bloomberg News.

via Why China’s Manufacturing Sector Has Hit a Wall – Businessweek.

Posted in China alert, Economics, Manufacturing | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Beijing, BNP Paribas, Capital Economics, China, chinese new year, HSBC, Markit, purchasing managers index

24/03/2014

China Cracks Down on Ghost City Monoliths – Businessweek

China is getting serious about reining in at least one aspect of its ghost cities—the monolithic work palaces built for civil servants. On March 19, the central government announced it has investigated 147 officials and punished 55 for violating a five-year ban, imposed last July, on construction of all new government buildings.

An empty apartment building construction project in Ordos city, Inner Mongolia, China

“The malpractice of constructing new government buildings should be exposed. Departments and individuals should never cover or shield the malpractice,” said the State Council in its statement. “Precious funds should be used for safeguarding and improving the people’s well-being,” the statement said, as reported by the official Xinhua News Agency.

The ban has at least two purposes. One is to compel local governments to spend state funds more wisely, as concerns about growing levels of debt are mounting. China’s National Development and Reform Commission last year announced that 144 cities in 12 provinces were planning to build more than 200 new towns.

STORY: Breaking Through China’s Great Firewall

A Feb. 20 analysis by Beijing economic consultancy Gavekal Dragonomics showed that by 2011, 45 percent of all investment in China was channeled into “stagnant or loser prefectures,”—defined as those with little or negative population growth.

“Empty towns and ghost cities are redundant constructions that do not generate much economic benefit. They are a huge waste of resources which pile debt pressure onto local governments,” editorialized the People’s Daily last year.

The ban is also part of President Xi Jinping’s effort to curb ostentatious behavior by government officials and crack down on graft. The aim is “to promote a national frugality campaign and curb official’s appropriation of public funds,” explained Xinhua.

via China Cracks Down on Ghost City Monoliths – Businessweek.

Posted in austerity, China alert, Construction, Economics | 2 Comments »

Tags: Asia, Beijing, Central government, China, government officials, Jilin, new government buildings, State Council, Xi JinPing, Xinhua

21/03/2014

Michelle Obama starts landmark trip[1]- Chinadaily.com.cn

After a long journey from Washington, US first lady Michelle Obama landed in Beijing on Thursday evening, starting her long-awaited trip to China with a big smile and a wave.

Michelle Obama starts landmark trip

When Obama, in an elegant black dress, stepped out of the plane with her mother and two teenager daughters, dozens of reporters that had waited in the airport for hours incessantly clicked their camera shutters.

Though nobody from the delegation spoke to the media, the first lady’s brief debut spread quickly on Chinese media and micro blogs, where users discussed what she would wear and eat, and how she will interact with Chinese first lady Peng Liyuan.

“It is another innovation in the history of Chinese diplomacy” and helps both sides’ leaders strengthen their personal relations, said Ruan Zongze, vice-president of the China Institute of International Studies.

Ruan was referring to the latest “creative” laid-back meeting between President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart, Barack Obama, at the Sunnylands resort in California last June, soon after Xi assumed office.

Peng, Xi’s wife, accompanied her husband on the Sunnylands visit but did not meet Michelle Obama, who was in Washington. Her absence left some Chinese disappointed and more excited about the “make-up” meeting.

On Friday, Michelle Obama, a Harvard-educated lawyer, is to spend almost the whole day with Peng. The two first ladies will visit a high school in Beijing, stroll inside the Forbidden City, eat Peking duck and watch a performance together.

“The meeting of the two first ladies shows that China is more open and is getting more involved with the international community,” Ruan said.

via Michelle Obama starts landmark trip[1]- Chinadaily.com.cn.

Posted in China alert, GeoPolitics, Politics | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Barack Obama, Beijing, China, China Institute of International Studies, Forbidden City, Michelle Obama, Obama, Peng Liyuan, President Xi Jinping, Ruan Zongze, Sunnylands, trip to China, US first lady Michelle Obama, Xi JinPing

21/03/2014

India’s Diesel Fuel Subsidy Breeds Toxic Air Pollution – Businessweek

Molecular biologist George Easow’s move to India to start a clinical diagnostics business lasted just three weeks before he decided to give up and return to the U.K. Within days of the family’s move to New Delhi, his 7-month-old daughter, Fiona, was wheezing and gasping for air because of smog. “She could hardly breathe,” says her father.

India's Diesel Cars Are Proving Lethal

Fiona was kept indoors and put on medication. Nothing worked. “We had to make a call,” Easow says, adding that her symptoms disappeared once they were back in the U.K. and haven’t returned. For the 16.8 million residents of India’s capital, the wheezing continues. The bad news is, it’s going to get worse.

Cities across India suffer from some of the poorest air quality in the world. The problem is so severe that it’s costing the country 1.1 trillion rupees ($18 billion) annually in the shortened life spans of productive members of the urban population, according to a June World Bank report.

STORY: Who Has Dirtier Air: China or India?

While Beijing and Shanghai air pollution caused by coal-burning factories are well known, Delhi residents suffer even more by some measures, though the main source of the smog is cars and trucks running on cheap diesel. Indian government subsidies for the fuel add up to $15 billion a year. Farmers and truckers, both big voting blocs, rely on cheap diesel.

India’s diesel-powered vehicles pump out exhaust gases with 10 times the carcinogenic particles found in gasoline exhaust. The result: Delhi’s air on average last year was laced with double the toxic particles per cubic meter reported in Beijing, leading to respiratory diseases, lung cancer, and heart attacks. “I have no doubt, 100 percent, that diesel exhaust is contributing to a rise in asthma, respiratory illnesses, and hospitalizations,” says Dr. T.K. Joshi, director of Delhi’s Centre for Occupational and Environmental Health at Maulana Azad Medical College.

via India’s Diesel Fuel Subsidy Breeds Toxic Air Pollution – Businessweek.

Posted in Economics, India alert, Pollution | Leave a Comment »

Tags: air pollution, Beijing, China, Delhi, Diesel engine, Environmental Health, India, Maulana Azad Medical College

21/03/2014

China Wants Its People in the Cities – Reuters

From: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-03-20/china-wants-its-people-in-the-cities

Thirty-five years ago, when paramount leader Deng Xiaoping launched gaige kaifang, or “reform and opening,” China was a much more agricultural country, with less than a fifth of its people living in cities. Since then hundreds of millions of rural residents have left the countryside, many seeking jobs in the export-oriented factories and construction sites that Deng’s policy promoted.

Commercial and residential buildings stand in the Luohu district of Shenzhen, China, on Dec. 18, 2013 In 1978 there were no Chinese cities with more than 10 million people and only two with 5 million to 10 million; by 2010, six cities had more than 10 million and 10 had from 5 million to 10 million. By the following year, a majority of Chinese were living in urban areas for the first time in the country’s history.

Now urbanization has been designated a national priority and is expected to occur even more rapidly. On March 16, Premier Li Keqiang’s State Council and the central committee of the Communist Party released the “National New-type Urbanization Plan (2014-2020),” which sets clear targets: By 2020 the country will have 60 percent of its people living in cities, up from 53.7 percent now.

What’s the ultimate aim of creating a much more urban country? Simply put, all those new, more free-spending urbanites are expected to help drive a more vibrant economy, helping wean China off its present reliance on unsustainable investment-heavy growth. “Domestic demand is the fundamental impetus for China’s development, and the greatest potential for expanding domestic demand lies in urbanization,” the plan says.

To get there, China’s policymakers know they have to loosen the restrictive hukou, the household registration policy that today keeps many Chinese migrants second-class urban residents. China will ensure that the proportion of those who live in the cities with full urban hukou, which provides better access to education, health care, and pensions, will rise from last year’s level of 35.7 percent of city dwellers to 45 percent by 2020. That means 100 million rural migrant workers, out of a total 270 million today, will have to be given urban household registration.

To prepare for the new masses, China knows it must vastly expand urban infrastructure. The plan calls for ensuring that expressways and railways link all cities with more than 200,000 people by 2020; high-speed rail is expected to link cities with more than a half million by then. Civil aviation will expand to be available to 90 percent of the population.

Access to affordable housing projects funded by the government is also expected to rise substantially. The target is to provide social housing (roughly analogous to public housing in the U.S.) to 23 percent of the urban populace by 2020; that’s up from an estimated 14.3 percent last year, according to Tao Wang, China economist at UBS Securities (UBS) in Hong Kong. That means providing social housing for an additional 90 million people, amounting to about 30 million units, over the next seven years, Wang writes in a March 18 report.

The urbanization plan appears to face several big challenges. First, the government wants to maintain restrictions on migration to China’s biggest cities, which also happen to be its most popular. Instead, the plan calls for liberalizing migration to small and midsize cities, or those with less than 5 million. Whether migrants will willingly flock to designated smaller cities, rather than the megacities including Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen, is an unanswered question.

…

Another obstacle to faster urbanization is that the plan doesn’t propose how to reform China’s decades-old land tenure system. Changing the system could allow farmers more freedom to mortgage, rent, or sell their land.

Finally, one of the most daunting problems is figuring out how to pay for implementing the ambitious urbanization targets. The cost of rolling out a much more extensive social welfare network will be substantial (today, most Chinese in the countryside have far lower levels of medical and pension coverage, as well as far inferior schools); building the new urban infrastructure will also be expensive.

…

Posted in Affluence, China alert, Consumer, Economics, Household registration, Housing, housing, land transfer, Migrant workers, Reform, urban development | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Beijing, China, Deng Xiaoping, Hong Kong, Li Keqiang, List of cities in the People's Republic of China, UBS, Urbanization

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Fashion contest the focus of ‘first lady diplomacy’ during Michelle Obama’s China visit | South China Morning Post

Foreign Brands Shift Focus to China’s Second-Tier Cities – Businessweek

Why China’s Manufacturing Sector Has Hit a Wall – Businessweek

China Cracks Down on Ghost City Monoliths – Businessweek

Michelle Obama starts landmark trip[1]- Chinadaily.com.cn

India’s Diesel Fuel Subsidy Breeds Toxic Air Pollution – Businessweek

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