Posts tagged ‘President of the People’s Republic of China’

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05/03/2016

The Limits of Growth: Economic Headwinds Inform China’s Latest Military Budget – China Real Time Report – WSJ

With an official defense budget increase of 7.6% to 954 billion yuan ($147 billion) announced today, Beijing’s quest to restore China’s historic “greatness” and to attain international status as a military power commensurate with its economic standing continues.

Yet with GDP growth slowing and social and demographic headwinds mounting, Chinese leaders face increasingly difficult tradeoffs concerning how to allocate government largesse.

With Beijing’s 2016 official defense budget, it is clear that even military spending is not immune to China’s economic and fiscal realities. Advance reports that this year’s official budget would entail an increase of as much as 20% proved significantly off-the-mark. So, what’s in a number? Nothing short of this: Beijing’s latest defense spending figure provides further evidence that it is determined to avoid succumbing to Soviet-style military overextension – yet it remains committed to enhancing capabilities to further its priorities, especially vis-à-vis contested island and maritime claims in the East and South China Seas.

Make no mistake: drawing on the world’s second-largest (and growing) economy, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is increasingly well-endowed and capable of asserting China’s regional interests. Even as GDP growth continues to slow, President Xi Jinping appears determined to order, and fund, ambitious military modernization and PLA reforms. The PLA is now far-and-away the world’s second best-resourced military and, unlike the globally-distributed and -deployed U.S. military, is focused overwhelmingly on its immediate neighborhood.

Source: The Limits of Growth: Economic Headwinds Inform China’s Latest Military Budget – China Real Time Report – WSJ

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05/03/2016

China Sets Economic Growth Target of 6.5% to 7% for 2016 – China Real Time Report – WSJ

China has set an economic growth target of between 6.5% and 7% for 2016 and an average of at least 6.5% over the next five years, goals that acknowledge slowing momentum in the world’s second-largest economy but which still could be difficult to reach.

As WSJ’s Mark Magnier reports:

By adopting a range for the first time in two decades, China has given itself more flexibility in a system where hitting goals set far in advance, regardless of conditions on the ground, remains politically important.

The targets released here on Saturday at the opening of the National People’s Congress, China’s annual parliament, weren’t a surprise given that senior officials from President Xi Jinping on down had flagged them in recent months.

But they underscore that the government continues to prioritize stability, as output in the world’s second-largest economy downshifts faster than expected.

Last year, China’s economy grew 6.9%, its slowest pace in 25 years, compared with the 2015 target of about 7%. This year could bring a new quarter-century low, as traditional growth engines continue to lose traction.

Source: China Sets Economic Growth Target of 6.5% to 7% for 2016 – China Real Time Report – WSJ

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02/03/2016

Today’s ‘Kings Without Crowns?’ — The Growing Powers of Xi’s Party Disciplinarians – China Real Time Report – WSJ

After hunting corrupt cadres over the past three years, the Communist Party’s much-feared graftbusters are switching gears to political policing.

In the process, they have emerged with an authority perhaps unparalleled since ancient China.

With President Xi Jinping’s blessing, the already-powerful Central Commission for Discipline Inspection is stationing inspectors in all central party and government departments, extending its reach into the top echelons of China’s bureaucracy.

In addition to targeting graft and waste, the CCDI has also become a kind of thought police for officials, academics and propagandists. Its inspectors are increasingly denouncing those deemed disloyalty to the party leadership.

The agency’s expanded scope reminded the Procuratorial Daily (in Chinese), a newspaper run by China’s top prosecutorial agency, of how Ming Dynasty rulers in the 14th century fortified a body of imperial censors who hunted errant officials in the name of the emperor.

Embedded in the Ming court’s six ministries, the censors could make direct representations to the emperor, despite their relatively junior rank, and assist the monarch in administrative tasks.

“But their most important power was to inspect the six ministries and impeach ministers,” the newspaper said. “It was this special status that made them ‘kings without crowns’ in the Ming Dynasty court.”

Recent developments, legal experts say, suggest that Mr. Xi is transforming the agency from a party watchdog into an arm of government.

“In effect, Xi Jinping is creating a parallel bureaucracy that can go around existing party and government institutions, to make things happen,” said Carl Minzner, a law professor at Fordham University who studies the Chinese legal system.

Disciplinary inspectors have also found a role in imposing party ideology beyond the traditional corridors of power.

Source: Today’s ‘Kings Without Crowns?’ — The Growing Powers of Xi’s Party Disciplinarians – China Real Time Report – WSJ

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08/02/2016

Gong Xi Fa Cai! What to expect in China’s Year of the Monkey – SCMP

The Year of the Monkey is expected to be another turbulent year for the world’s second largest economy. Here, SCMP reporters gaze into their crystal balls for what might lie ahead.

An installation celebrates the Year of the Monkey at Ditan Park in Beijing. Photo: EPA

POLITICS: Political jockeying and more crackdowns

The Communist Party will be focused on preparations for a new leadership team, to be unveiled at the 19th Party Congress next year. Apart from President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Premier Li Keqiang (李克強), the rest of the Politburo Standing Committee will have reached retirement age. The new appointments will be keenly observed for clues as to who Xi intends to succeed him.

Two of Xi’s signature campaigns – the drives against corruption and in favour of frugality in public life – are likely to continue to reshape the nation.

…

– Cary Huang

DIPLOMACY: Conflicts and tensions to escalate

Following Xi’s maiden presidential visit to the Middle East, Beijing is expected to increase its role as a broker in the region’s conflicts. Beijing has already hosted representatives from Syria and Afghanistan for talks. But other than calling for dialogue, China’s options are limited, partly because it does not want to be seen as interfering in the internal affairs of other nations.

With the Beijing-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank having just started operations, China is expected to boost its economic diplomacy by funding infrastructure projects overseas.

Tensions in the South China Sea are also expected to rise, as China is likely to continue building structures in the disputed waters. How the United States and China handle the issue – especially the Pentagon’s deployment of warships within 12 nautical miles of Chinese-controlled islands – will be the biggest concern.

– Teddy Ng

DEFENCE: Band(s) of Brothers?

The top priority of the military will be to rebuild morale and its integrity following its restructuring into five theatre commands. Xi set the tone this month by visiting Jinggangshan, the cradle of the communist revolution in China. The Eastern Theatre Command’s land force quickly followed his lead and visited Gutian in Fujian (福建) province, where the Red Army pledged obedience to the party in 1929, and saluted the party flag. Other commands are expected to make similar displays of fidelity.

It will be a bumpy road: the old ways of managing operations, carrying out orders through personal connections and using favoured contractors, has been upended. Xi wants to turn the PLA into a fighting force that meets international standards, with all the efficiencies and accountability that entails.

– Minnie Chan

ECONOMY: Pandora’s Box to open?

There’s actually little disagreement between billionaire investor George Soros and Beijing decision-makers over China’s economic prospects in 2016 – both agree growth will be lower in 2016 than that of 2015. Where they disagree is on how much and how quickly.

One thing is for sure, China will never admit an economic “hard-landing”, though investors may find plenty of evidence for one – from factory closures to rising unemployment and financial strains.

…

– Zhou Xin

UNEMPLOYMENT: What’s the real picture?

Of all of China’s official economic indicators, the registered urban jobless rate is possibly the least reliable. The rate, released quarterly, has barely ever moved from 4.1 per cent in recent years, regardless of the economic cycle. Another jobless rate compiled by the statistics agency, which is increasingly being cited by the premier, claims a level of about 5 per cent.

Neither of these official rates are likely to change much throughout 2016.

…

– Zhou Xin

A-shares: Beware the bear!

The mainland’s stock market, after witnessing a sharp fall at the beginning of 2016, is expected to continue a bear run in the Year of Monkey amid a crisis of confidence.

A depreciating yuan, the imminent launch of the new initial public offering (IPO) mechanism and a bleak outlook for corporate earnings are set to exacerbate weak sentiment with millions of retail investors suffering paper losses following a market rout last year.

Local investors are increasingly betting on a further downturn in the A-share market.

Corporate earnings are likely to stay flat in 2016 despite Beijing’s increased efforts to navigate a transition to a consumer-led growth.

– Daniel Ren

Consumption: Bittersweet for retailers

Online stores are continuing to take business from their brick-and-mortar counterparts.

While overall consumption growth is expected to further slow in 2016, bringing problems for both sectors, shopping malls and big stores face their own particular woes.

Hypermarkets could see custom slow, but business at smaller formats such as mini-marts and convenience stores should remain stable.

People will continue to spend more on tourism, leisure, food and health-related products.

Domestic brands will continue to gain ground on foreign ones.

Women will continue to take a greater role in driving spending. Consulting firm Mintel found more than half of Chinese mothers control the family budget and that women are more willing to try new products and experiences than men.

– Mandy Zuo

E-commerce: Click, click, click to buy, buy, buy

The personal computer era is over. Mobile-commerce, which enables people to buy everything from anywhere via the internet, is dominating the online sector and this trend shows no sign of stopping.

Retail on WeChat, the most popular social media platform, is expected to grow steadily. The mobile platform is also becoming an important tool of advertising and communication for businesses.

Online to offline (O2O) business will continue to boom as mainlanders show growing interest and loyalty in professional home services such as home cleaning and massage.

With growing demand from mainland consumers for prime goods overseas, fiercer competition is expected in cross-border business. Internet giants, entrepreneurs and small businesses will flock to the sector, which the Ministry of Commerce projects will grow an average 30 per cent in the next few years.

– Mandy Zuo

P2P lending: More closures, collapses and runaway owners

The long-awaited regulations reining in peer-to-peer lending are expected to bring an industry shakeup that will knock out a significant number of players.

Industry data showed the number of P2P lending platforms dropped a second consecutive month to 2,566 at the end of January from 2,595 in December.

The draft rules, released by the China Banking Regulatory Commission at the end of 2015, define P2P lending platforms as internet financing intermediaries and forbid them from selling wealth management and other financial products that attract investors with promises of high returns.

…

– Kwong Man-ki

Tourism: Slowdown, what slowdown?

Despite the economic slowdown, the depreciation of the yuan and turmoil in the stock markets, Chinese tourists passed a milestone last year – making a record 120 million outbound trips and spending US$104.5 billion to make China the world’s leading source of tourists.

The boom is expected to continue this year, thanks to a relaxation in visa policies in more countries as well as a strong yuan against the euro and yen.

…

– Laura Zhou

Childbirth: More buns in the oven

The Year of the Monkey is traditionally regarded an auspicious year for giving birth, so it will prove popular with people planning families. Some of those may have delayed their plans from the Year of the Goat, which is decidedly inauspicious.

More of the newborns are likely to be second children, as parents seek to benefit from the new policy allowing all couples to have two children.

…

– Zhuang Pinghui

URBANISATION: Millions to relocate

Urbanisation will maintain its pace with millions relocating, most of them rural residents.

They will continue to move to cities near rivers, railway lines and coastlines and more of them will be migrating with spouses and children.

The policy of issuing residence permits to migrants and granting urban household registrations to rural residents are helping them to access public services and integrate in urban life.

– Zhuang Pinghui

ENVIRONMENT: More smoggy days?

As the new five-year plan period (2016-2020) begins, cities will need to set targets on how to improve water and air quality. But whether much can be done to reduce smog problems – especially in heavily polluted city clusters near Beijing and Shanghai – depends largely on how determined local governments are to slash overcapacity in heavy industries.

At the end of 2015, Beijing’s persistent smog pushed the city authorities to pledge better management of small-scale coal burning. If other cities follow suit, the move could impact China’s environmental footprint.

…

– Li Jing

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/policies-politics/article/1910019/kung-hei-fat-choy-what-expect-chinas-year-monkey

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24/01/2016

Well-wishing | The Economist

SINCE he took over as China’s leader in 2012, Xi Jinping has been a busy globetrotter. Last year he visited more countries than Barack Obama, America’s president (14 against 11).

Heedless of whether his hosts are powerful, puny or pariahs, he has flown everywhere from America to the Maldives and Zimbabwe. Mr Xi wants to project China’s rising power—and his role in promoting that—to foreign and domestic audiences. But until this week, he had not set a presidential foot in the Middle East.

The trip, under way as The Economist went to press, began in Saudi Arabia (whose king, Salman bin Abdul Aziz, is pictured with Mr Xi). He then visited Egypt and was due to finish his tour in Iran. No Chinese president had toured the region since 2009. China’s leaders had worried about getting embroiled in the region’s intractable disputes. But China has a big stake in the Middle East. It is the world’s largest oil importer and gets more than half of its crude from the region (see chart). Mr Xi’s much ballyhooed “new Silk Route”, aimed at linking China and Europe with the help of Chinese-funded infrastructure, runs across the Middle East. Chinese companies are already building expressways and harbours there. In this section Divorce: a love story Well-wishing Reprints Related topics Middle East Politics Government and politics World politics Asia-Pacific politics

The timing of Mr Xi’s tour is tricky. Tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran are particularly high after Saudi Arabia executed a Shia cleric earlier this month and angry Iranians responded by storming the Saudi embassy in Tehran. But the lifting of Western sanctions on Iran on January 16th (see article) allowed Mr Xi to display even-handedness by visiting both countries, without upsetting Western powers. Mr Xi, like his predecessors, likes to present China as a non-interfering champion of peace. (Xinhua, China’s state-run news agency, said this week that the West’s “meddling hands” were “more of a mortal poison than of a magic potion” in the Middle East.) But Mr Xi is not keen to play a central role as peacemaker. China’s first “Arab Policy Paper”, released on January 13th, is a vague, waffly document. It talks of “building a new type of international relations”, but is devoid of new ideas.

Zhang Ming, a vice-foreign minister, said this week that economic development was the “ultimate way out” of conflict in the region. By expanding its trade and investment links with the Middle East, China hopes discontent and conflict there will gradually dissipate. In addition to crushing dissent, it is trying a similar approach in Xinjiang, a province in western China with a large Muslim population—so far without success.

In the long run, China may find it hard to avoid taking sides. To some extent it has already done so in Syria: it talks to representatives from both the Syrian government and the opposition, but by vetoing UN resolutions on intervention it tilts, in effect, in the government’s favour. The presence of a growing number of Chinese citizens in the Middle East may challenge China’s non-interventionist approach. After a Chinese national was executed by Islamic State in November, China promised to strengthen protection of its citizens abroad. Its new rules of Middle Eastern diplomacy could end up resembling familiar Western meddling

Source: Well-wishing | The Economist

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22/01/2016

Chinese president offers remedies for Mideast predicaments, aid to Arab development – Xinhua | English.news.cn

Out-of-the box thinking.  Hope other major powers start to subscribe to this point of view. The current ones  of taking sides and partisan fighting isn’t working.

“Visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday prescribed his remedies to restore peace in the Middle East and promote development in the Arab world.

EGYPT-CAIRO-CHINA-XI JINPING-VISIT

While delivering a speech at the headquarters of the Arab League, Xi described the Middle East region, which in many’s eyes is almost an equivalent to wars and tumult, as a “land of abundance.”

PATH TO PEACE

The Chinese leader concluded in the remarks that dialogues and development are the key factors that can help bring peace and stability back in this part of the world.

He said use of force offers no solution to problems, neither will zero-sum mentality bring enduring peace, adding that for the success of talks, there is need for utmost patience and flexibility.

Speaking of the Syrian crisis, he said there will be no winner out of a conflict, and to address the hot-spots, what is the most urgent, is to bring about cease-fire and start political talks.

Xi also believed that turmoil in the Middle East stems from the lack of development, while the ultimate solution will depend on development, saying that only when young people are able to live a fulfilled life with dignity can hope prevail in their heart. Only then will they voluntarily reject violence, extremist ideologies and terrorism.

Mahmoud Allam, former Egyptian ambassador to China, admitted that many of the deep-rooted problems the Arab world is grappling with have been the result of failures to achieve a successful development model, saying development is no doubt the most viable path of mobilizing people toward achieving their common interests and overcoming disagreements.

TANGIBLE HELP

Also in his speech, the Chinese president introduced a host of fresh moves including loans, financial aid and common investment fund to help improve livelihood, fight terrorism and promote development in the Arab world.

The Chinese government has decided to pledge 50 million RMB (7.53 million U.S. dollars) to help improve the lives of the Palestinians and 230 million RMB (about 35 million dollars) for Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya and Yemen as humanitarian assistance, said Xi.

Beijing also wants to promote the industrialization in the Middle East. To achieve that end, China is going to hand out a number of loan programs, including a 15-billion exclusive loan, a 10-billion business lending, and 10 billion concessional loans so as to facilitate production capacity cooperation between China and the regional countries, according to the president.

Meanwhile, China also prepares to work with the United Arab Emirates and Qatar to set up a common investment fund worth 20 billion dollars that focuses on traditional sources of energy in the Middle East, infrastructure, and high-end manufacturing.

Xi also offered in his speech 300 million dollars for law enforcement cooperation, police training so as to help build up the abilities of the regional countries to maintain stability.China also planned to provide 1,000 training opportunities for young Arab leaders, and strengthen exchanges among their think tanks, experts and scholars.

CHINA’S DOS AND DON’TS IN MIDEAST

The Chinese leader also said his country will neither look for proxies nor try to fill any “vacuum” in the Middle East, adding that Beijing has no intention of building any sphere of influence in the region.

“Instead of looking for a proxy in the Middle East, we promote peace talks; instead of seeking any sphere of influence, we call on all parties to join the circle of friends for the Belt and Road Initiative; instead of attempting to fill the ‘vacuum’, we build a cooperative partnership network for win-win outcomes,” he said.

Meanwhile, Xi promised that China will not link terrorism with any specific ethnic group or religion, as doing so will only create ethnic and religious tensions, adding that there should be no double standards in battling terrorism.

Also, he said the Middle East is the meeting place of ancient human civilizations and home to diverse and splendid cultures. China will continue to unswervingly support Middle East and Arab states in preserving their ethnic and cultural traditions, and oppose all forms of discrimination and prejudice against specific ethnic group and religion.”

Source: Chinese president offers remedies for Mideast predicaments, aid to Arab development – Xinhua | English.news.cn

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08/01/2016

Three political questions looming over China’s leadership in 2016 – WSJ China Real Time

From: http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2016/01/08/three-political-questions-looming-over-chinas-leadership-in-2016/?mod=djemChinaRTR_h

Last year saw more attention to Chinese President Xi Jinping as China’s paramount leader, including what many observers have seen as a cult of personality. The economy may eclipse politics as a concern for Beijing in 2016, but in China the two are always closely intertwined. Here are the three major political questions that will loom over the Xi leadership in the months to come.

  1. Is it time for thelong-running anticorruption campaignto shift its focus?

In laying out a vision for his anti-corruption drive in 2013, Xi Jinping vowed to go after both high-ranking “tigers” and low-level “flies.” So far the campaign has been fueled by the takedowns of a procession of big cats – but there are signs that a change is in the offing.

There’s upside to an increased focus on local cadres and others at the insect level. For one, it would send a signal to doubters that the anti-graft campaign is genuine, not just a way to purge Xi’s political enemies. It would also help Xi score points with regular citizens and reform-minded officials outraged at the pervasiveness of corruption in China.

But there’s also a political risk. Already, the current crusade has compelled many officials to hunker down and sit on their hands to avoid attracting attention – a phenomenon that has slowed policymaking. Likewise, many developers remain wary of starting new projects that might aid an ailing economy because they’re still not sure what’s permissible in the new environment.

Broadening the anti-graft campaign could handcuff policymaking even further, because cadres will spend time looking over their shoulders, and entrepreneurs, wondering about political support, will wait until the dust settles before embarking on new commercial initiatives.

  1. What sort of politics does China want to practice?

Xi Jinping and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang agree on a great deal, but they have distinctive notions about how to build a better China.

Xi believes that China’s political future rests on a reassertion of the party’s rule, preventing potential challenges from social groups, and convincing citizens and cadres alike that the government stands for something more than just nationalism — that socialism is still relevant but needs to be recast in ways that appeal to society.

Li appears to see his political mission differently. In his eyes, ideological renovation is far less crucial to the country than administrative restructuring and being a more efficient and approachable government. It’s innovation, not rectification, Li argues, that will secure the Party’s legitimacy. From experimenting with new ways to measure China’s actual economic performance to making bureaucratic requirements easier for citizens to meet, Li has created a profile for himself that challenges the prevailing political course being set by Xi.

While Xi wants more control over society, Li argues for less oversight and regulation in China’s economy and bureaucracy–making it easier for businesses to start up and succeed as a way of preventing social pressure from becoming a political threat.

Thus far, the policy divide between Xi and Li hasn’t resulted in political warfare. But some lower-level cadres are increasingly perplexed about which template to follow: They’ve been quietly pressing for clarification about whether they should be focusing on being better Communists, or on building a more efficient and responsive government. It’s not clear how they can accomplish both, especially when they’re under the anticorruption microscope.

The economy could catalyze conflict here. If slower growth turns into a tailspin, Li and his allies will surely press to have their agenda for change adopted more widely, and argue that the current strategy of “politics before economics” championed by Xi isn’t working. Xi and his comrades won’t concede the political high-ground they currently occupy without a fight.

Xi and Li have been doing a fine job of sharing responsibility up to now, but the divide in their approaches is getting wider, and the challenges China faces will very likely compel one model to be adopted at the expense of the other.

  1. What happens if resistance to Xi’s reforms becomes active political opposition?

Xi’s efforts to centralize party control over the economy and society have been ruthless. Even the hint of organized opposition to party policies has brought out the truncheon swingers, with censorship or jail awaiting those who propose an alternative political path for China.

Observers who see Xi’s main opposition as coming from the Chinese street are looking down a now-empty avenue. They should be paying attention to disquiet within the ranks of officialdom.

The boldness and breadth of Xi’s reforms have led some in the party ranks to wonder privately about—and even openly question—whether his handling of China’s challenges has always been correct. For example, there are some who contend that the anticorruption campaign has placed too much power in the hands of discipline inspectors and unnecessarily disrupted the status quo (in Chinese).

Some of that scrutiny concerns Xi’s efforts to reinsert the Party more fully into economic and social life, a move that risks stoking discontent in a populace that has grown used to a certain level of leeway in recent decades. There are also those within the political apparatus who see Xi’s recent restructuring of China’s military as courageous but more aimed at quelling dissent from the armed forces than rejuvenating strategy and doctrine. Even Xi himself has noted in a recently released collection of internal speeches (in Chinese) that not everything he has been doing has been met with universal acclaim within the Communist party. Murmurs of discord have reached a level in recent months where a number of officials have been punished for “improper discussion” of Party policies.

Thus far, the angst, anxiety and antagonism within the government to Xi’s reforms remain unorganized. That’s because no one has proposed an alternative strategy for dealing with the nation’s many challenges that would unify the disaffected to act against Beijing. Social activists have little political support from above; annoyed cadres are afraid that any move to form a coalition could plunge the country into civil unrest.

Xi and his allies have been as determined as they’ve been daring in following their own reform path—and their success in getting their way politically has been remarkable thus far. The most pressing question for this new year is whether what has worked thus far will continue to do so—or whether the disaffected in China start believing that their leadership may have begun to run out of answers.

 

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31/12/2015

2015 Chinese diplomacy: Reaching farther and wider – Xinhua | English.news.cn

2015 has been a productive year not only for China, but for its partners all over the world. The world’s second largest economy reached out farther and wider, through initiatives such as the “Belt and Road” and the “AIIB“. And President Xi Jinping led the way.

 

President Xi Jinping’s official state visit to the UK was full of pomp and pageantry and the occasional imbibing. Footage of President Xi and Prime Minister David Cameron enjoying a pint and some banter in an English pub went viral in China. And the rest is history. The consumer power of the world’s second largest economy has been felt fully by the British beer company. Just this time, it started with President Xi himself.

And in the year 2015, it’s been a recurring story. Wherever the Chinese president travels, Chinese investment and consumer power are his companions. From projects worth in the billions. There’s Chinese investment in the UK infrastructure and energy sector.

Chinese financing of Russian and Central Asian natural gas projects and China’s pledge of 60 billion dollars of development funds to African nations.

To a more personal touch, a visit, in the case of Boeing, by the President of the world’s largest airplane market, means shored up confidence for some 160-thousand employees, against the backdrop of a wobbly global economy, The president also brought Ping Pong diplomacy to a high school in Washington State while students there returned the favor by showing the well-known football fan, a different kind of football. And this viral photo of President Xi brought forward cutting edge research at the Imperial College London.

2015 has been a year when Chinese initiatives were taking root and taking shape on a global scale from the Belt and road initiative. To the AIIB, and the south-south cooperation fund. Economies reshaped and lives transformed or in the case of Greene King, a centuries old British beer finding a new Chinese following.

Source: 2015 Chinese diplomacy: Reaching farther and wider – Xinhua | English.news.cn

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30/12/2015

Historian praises China’s global infrastructure building, criticizes West’s destructive methods – Xinhua | English.news.cn

China, with its impressive international infrastructure initiatives, has injected impetus into global growth, a U.S.-German historian has said, while criticizing Washington’s hawkish attitude, as reported by Sputnik.

China is “leading an economic renaissance of a scale not seen in more than a century,” said F. William Engdahl, a historian and economic researcher, in his recent article for New Eastern Outlook. “Beijing is, with customary Chinese speed, linking its economy by land and by sea lanes to all Eurasia,” the historian wrote, previously saying that China is “moving forward with an impressive array of major international infrastructure projects” in various regions. “For my side, I infinitely prefer the peaceful building projects to the destroying ones,” Engdahl said.

During the Johannesburg Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in early December in South Africa, Chinese President Xi Jinping unveiled the 60-billion-U.S.-dollar aid package for Africa in the next three years. The package seeks to help Africa to industrialize, modernize its agricultural production, boost the skills of its workers, build infrastructure and improve its health care.

“Unlike NATO’s endless wars, construction of infrastructure — railways, water navigation, electric power grids, lifts people up and enhances peace and stability,” Engdahl said, pointing out that Xi’s offer benefits both Africa and China.

China is also establishing a more amicable, vibrant neighborhood and is deepening economic ties with European countries through its Belt and Road initiative. The Belt and Road initiative, comprising the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, was brought up by Xi in 2013, with the aim of building a trade and infrastructure network connecting Asia with Europe and Africa along the ancient Silk Road routes.

The initiative creates a “golden opportunity” for the countries of Central and Eastern Europe that are facing economic difficulties, linking the East and the West of the Eurasian continent through a vast network of high-speed railways and maritime routes, Engdahl said.

“China is the world address in rail infrastructure today, while the West, led by the pathetic rail construction record of the USA, falls farther and farther behind,” Engdahl said, referring to China’s planned construction of a Hungary-Serbia high-speed railway. The railway linking the capitals of Hungary and Serbia, Budapest and Belgrade, has a total length of 350 km, with 184 km in Serbia. It is designed for electric passenger and cargo trains with a maximum speed of 200 km per hour. Once complete, it will help create a fast lane for importing and exporting products between China and Europe.

Besides recognizing the export of “Chinese rail technology” to Europe, the researcher also mentioned Beijing’s intentions to invest in constructing and upgrading port facilities in the Baltic, Adriatic, and Black Seas.

Source: Historian praises China’s global infrastructure building, criticizes West’s destructive methods – Xinhua | English.news.cn

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01/12/2015

Boost for China as it joins IMF elite – FT.com

The IMF on Monday gave a major vote of confidence to China and its reform efforts, giving the renminbi greater weighting than the yen or pound as it included the currency in its elite basket of reserve currencies.

Chinese one-hundred yuan banknotes are stacked for a photograph at the Korea Exchange Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, on Thursday, Feb. 27, 2014. Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg

The vote by the board to make the renminbi the fifth currency in the basket used to value the IMF’s own de facto currency followed months of deliberation at the fund and years of lobbying by a Beijing eager for the recognition.

“The Rmb’s elevation to the club of elite global reserve currencies is a big step for China and a significant one for the international monetary system,” said Eswar Prasad, professor of economics at Cornell University and a former IMF China mission chief.

The renminbi will become the third biggest currency in the “special drawing rights” basket when it takes effect on October 1. The move is largely symbolic but Christine Lagarde, IMF managing director, called it a “milestone” in China’s economic reform “journey” and its integration into the global financial system.

Following the move the currency slipped 0.19 per cent to Rmb6.4374 against the dollar in offshore trading in Hong Kong.

The People’s Bank of China set its daily “fix” — the onshore rate around which the currency can trade 2 per cent either side — at Rmb6.3973 per dollar, its fourth consecutive slightly weaker rate.

Investors generally expect China to allow its currency to weaken gradually but few see much likelihood of a repeat of its 3 per cent August devaluation, which sent shockwaves through global markets.

Source: Boost for China as it joins IMF elite – FT.com

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