26/08/2013

China supports U.N. investigation in Syria, urges caution

China (and Russia) have finally stopped giving President Assad their full support.

(Reuters) – China supports an independent and objective investigation by U.N. experts into allegations of the use of chemical weapons in Syria, China’s foreign minister said on Monday, while urging a cautious response and political resolution to the crisis.

United Nations (U.N.) vehicles transport a team of U.N. chemical weapons experts to the scene of a poison gas attack outside the Syrian capital last week, in Damascus August 26, 2013. REUTERS/Khaled al-Hariri

“China has paid close attention to the reports of the use of chemical weapons inside Syria, and China resolutely opposes the use of chemical weapons no matter who uses them,” Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in a statement on the ministry’s website.

“China supports the U.N.’s secretariat to, in accordance with relevant U.N. resolutions, open an independent, objective, fair and professional investigation, to find out what really happened as soon as possible,” Wang said.

U.N. inspectors left central Damascus on Monday to investigate sites of an alleged chemical weapons strike on the outskirts of the Syrian capital, after calls from Western powers for military action to punish what may be the world’s worst chemical attack in 25 years.

Wang did not directly refer to the threats of military action, but urged a careful handling of the matter.

“The only way out for the Syrian issue is a political resolution,” he said. “All parties ought to cautiously handle the Syrian chemical weapons issue to avoid interfering in (efforts) to resolve the Syrian issue politically.”

Syria agreed on Sunday to allow the inspectors to visit the site. But the United States and its allies say evidence has probably been destroyed by heavy government shelling of the area over the past five days. It said the offer to allow inspectors came too late.

Major powers including Russia, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad‘s main ally which has long blocked U.N.-sponsored intervention against him, have urged the Syrian leader to cooperate with U.N. chemical weapons inspectors already in Damascus to pursue earlier allegations.

China said last week that no side should rush to pre-judge the results of any investigation by U.N. chemical weapons experts in Syria, who it said should carry out an objective and impartial inquiry in consultation with the Syrian government.

via China supports U.N. investigation in Syria, urges caution | Reuters.

Posted in China alert, GeoPolitics, Good news, Politics | 2 Comments »

Tags: Bashar al-Assad, Chemical warfare, Chemical weapon, China, Damascus, middle-east, politics, president assad, Syria, syrian chemical weapons, United States

20/08/2013

Critical similarities and differences in security structures of Asia and Europe

This post – http://www.europesworld.org/NewEnglish/Home_old/CommunityPosts/tabid/809/PostID/3535/CriticalsimilaritiesanddifferencesinsecuritystructuresofAsiaandEurope.aspx

is courtesy of:

Prof. (FH) Dr. Anis Bajrektarevic, Acting Deputy Director of Studies EXPORT EU–ASEAN–NAFTA

Professor and Chairperson

International Law and Global Political Studies

University of Applied Sciences IMC-Krems

Austria, EUROPE

Posted in China alert, Chindia Alert, Economics, India alert, Politics | Leave a Comment »

Tags: ASEAN, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Cairo, Egypt, European Union, International law, North American Free Trade Agreement, research, United States

19/08/2013

Japan’s Giant New Destroyer Sends A Clear Message To China, The World

Business Insider: “Sixty-eight years to the day of the Hiroshima bombing, Japan unveiled its new naval “destroyer” that happens to have a flat-top – dubbed “Izumo” — capable of carrying various rotary-wing aviation units, reports Eric Talmadge of ABC.

The Izumo has been in construction since 2009.

The new boat comes as Chinese officials say the country is in “no rush” to sign a code of conduct guiding military behaviour in the contested South China Sea.

From ABC:

[S]ome experts believe the new Japanese ship could potentially be used in the future to launch fighter jets or other aircraft that have the ability to take off vertically. That would be a departure for Japan, which has one of the best equipped and best trained naval forces in the Pacific but which has not sought to build aircraft carriers of its own because of constitutional restrictions that limit its military forces to a defensive role.

The “constitutional restrictions” refer to the American-written post-World War II Japanese Constitution which stipulated — among other things — a ban on the construction of certain military equipment. To this day, Japan euphemistically refers to its army as a Self-Defence Force.

Still, a restless Beijing patrolling more and more in the South China Sea, as well as an unpredictable North Korea, have caused alarm in some Japanese citizens. They’ve been pushing for more military spending, some say for fear that American sequester means a shorter reach for Washington in the island disputes.

Japan’s most recent defence white paper covered an increased budget and mentioned Chinese encroachment directly, “China has attempted to change the status quo by force based on its own assertion, which is incompatible with the existing order of international law.”

Two of the aims of Japan’s first increase in defence spending in 11 years were, according to the WSJ, “developing the ability to launch pre-emptive attacks on enemy bases abroad and the creation of an amphibious force similar to the U.S. Marine Corps.”

This even amid the widely touted U.S. “pacific pivot” and recent news of the Philippines sending a refurbished American Coast Guard cutter to join up with another used U.S. cutter in patrolling the contested seas.

China’s appetite for natural resources is growing though, so more Americans and cutters are unlikely to deter their claims. From Reuters:

Friction over the South China Sea, one of the world’s most important waterways, has surged as China uses its growing naval might to more forcefully assert its vast claims over the oil- and gas-rich sea, raising fears of a military clash.

Japan’s new flat-top doesn’t have slingshots for fixed wing aircraft — yet — but certainly the helicopters the boat carries will help patrol what Japan takes to be its sovereign territory.

Nonetheless, they say the boat is primarily for relief from natural disasters, something Japan has had no shortage of over the last few years.

In September, China will host the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) for talks on a maritime Code of Conduct regulating passage in the South China Sea.”

via Japan’s Giant New Destroyer Sends A Clear Message To China, The World | Business Insider Australia.

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

Tags: Aftermath of World War II, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, China, Japan, Military, South China Sea, United States

29/07/2013

Capability building in China

Abbreviated from: http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/asia-pacific/capability_building_in_china?cid=china-eml-alt-mip-mck-oth-1307

Article|McKinsey Quarterly

Capability building in China

Skill building must be rewards-based, rooted in real work, and tailored to local conditions.

July 2013 | byKarel Eloot, Gernot Strube, and Arthur Wang

Capability building—leadership, managerial, and team-based skills rather than technical ones—has become an urgent imperative for many companies in China. As the country loses its extreme low-cost-labor advantage, businesses must look for ways to increase productivity and internal collaboration, to better understand consumers, and to develop a more sophisticated appetite for risk.

Companies in China face many of the same challenges—a lack of up-front planning and inadequate resources—that bedevil capability-building exercises everywhere. But certain “China factors” stand out. For starters, the demand for managers with strong leadership skills and international experience is growing significantly faster than the supply of qualified candidates. That imbalance makes it more difficult to pull off successful skill-building efforts, even for multinationals that typically invest more in training than Chinese companies do. (Indeed, one implication of China’s white-hot war for talent is that outside trainers brought in by multinational companies to set up and run new programs often move on before relevant tools and internal processes are in place.) Another perennial challenge for multinationals: the Chinese context and culture, which may require local tailoring of global approaches.

Then, of course, there are China’s state-owned enterprises. Many of them only recently converted from government departments into commercial entities and are still working to adapt to a competitive environment and adopt a true business mind-set. These companies generally lack a systematic approach to nurturing employees moving up the organizational ladder. They misconstrue capability building as a classroom activity, missing the impact of linking it to actual business. And they are too inflexible either to fire underperformers or to reward and promote employees, including managers, who change their behavior and adopt the necessary mind-sets.

While the challenges facing multinationals and state-owned enterprises differ, our experience with leaders at both kinds of organizations (as well as with private-sector Chinese companies) has highlighted the importance of some common, broadly applicable principles. In this article, we describe three that should help companies overcome many of the obstacles that have frustrated capability-building efforts in the past.

1. Relate capability building to real activities

…

2. Instill incentives and create opportunities for promotion

…

3. Don’t forget China’s unique culture

…

The solutions may sound obvious: developing Chinese teaching materials to help solve problems, building day-to-day business problems around products that participants would find in the Chinese market, and localizing global training materials through culturally appropriate metaphors and examples. But we know from experience how easy it is to overlook these issues. In our own work, we routinely use a case involving a coffee machine to teach managers about the seven types of waste and how a “lean” perspective can address them. When we recently used this case at a Chinese state-owned enterprise, however, the managers couldn’t make sense of the story, because they had never used a coffee machine. We have now adapted the context to tea making.

About the authors

Karel Eloot is a director in McKinsey’s Shanghai office; Gernot Strube is a director in the Hong Kong office, where Arthur Wang is a principal.

Posted in China alert, Economics | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Business, China, Chinese, Management, McKinsey & Company, Multinational corporation, United States

29/07/2013

China’s brain drain may be world’s worst

China Daily: “Sun Zhipei has only been in Helsinki for four months, but he has already decided it is where he wants to settle.

The 35-year-old nanotech scientist previously spent almost 10 years living in Spain and Britain, and said he would not entertain the idea of returning to his native China.

“I can have more control about what I want to study here and carry out projects I’m interested in,” said the associate professor at Aalto University, who gained his PhD at the Chinese Academy of Sciences‘ Institute of Physics.

Sun’s attitude perhaps goes some way toward explaining a People’s Daily report in June that said China is experiencing “the world’s worst brain drain”.

Eighty-seven percent of the mainland’s top specialists in science and engineering who went abroad for work or study have no plans to return, the paper quoted an unnamed official with the Party’s coordination group on specialists as saying.

The group consists of 20 Party and government agencies, including the Organization Department of the Communist Party of China’s Central Committee, which oversees human resources.

China Daily interview requests with the organization department went unanswered.

Although independent experts and statistics do not confirm the severity of the brain drain, there is little doubt it exists.

Wang Huiyao, director-general of the Center for China and Globalization, a Beijing-based think tank, said since the reform and opening-up policy of the late 1970s, 2.6 million Chinese students have studied overseas, of which about half went to the United States.”

via China’s brain drain may be world’s worst |Society |chinadaily.com.cn.

Posted in Economics, Espionage, Ethnic clash | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Beijing, China, Chinese Academy of Sciences, communist party of china, United States

28/07/2013

U.S. – China Five Initiative Plan Will Foster Future Climate Actions

Climate Law Blog: “The United States and China agreed upon a multi-faceted climate plan to curb GHG emission at the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue (S&ED) on July 10, 2013. The plan was designed by the U.S.-China Working Group on Climate Change, which was established pursuant to a Joint Statement from both governments in April 2013. It is led by the U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change, Todd Stern, and the Vice Chairman of China’s National Development and Reform Commission, Xie Zhenhua.

The first Strategic and Economic Dialogue was held in Washington, DC on July 27th and 28th. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The U.S. and China together account for around 45% of the world’s annual GHG emissions; the two countries thus bear much of the global responsibility for the changing climate. The Working Group’s Report first took stock of existing cooperative efforts between the two countries and found a breadth of joint programs and projects. Recognizing the enormous potential to deepen those collaborative actions, the Working Group recommended five key initiatives, which will be implemented to facilitate large-scale cooperative efforts and domestic actions beginning in October 2013. These new initiatives include:

* Reducing emissions from heavy-duty and other vehicles

* Increasing carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS)

* Increasing energy efficiency in buildings, industry, and transport

* Improving greenhouse gas data collection and management

* Promoting smart grids

Both sides will gain sustainable economic growth from these low carbon developments on the basis of existing domestic policy and bilateral collaboration. Moreover, China will particularly benefit from reducing its air pollution and thereby improving public health through reducing emissions from heavy-duty and other vehicles.

The five-initiative plan directly followed a recent bilateral meeting in June 2013 in which presidents Obama and Xi agreed that the two countries will work together to phase down the production and consumption of HFC on both sides of the Pacific.

Though the agreement is non-binding, collaboration in climate strategy between U.S. and China is likely to spur a global response to come up with new efforts to combat climate change through enhancing domestic actions. Through October 2013, specific implementation plans regarding each of the five initiatives will be worked out. The Working Group will ensure that these are implemented with the involvement of large companies and non-governmental organizations.

Domestically, both countries have adopted laws or regulations addressing climate change. President Obama’s new climate policy announced in late June signaled the Administration’s commitment to regulating power plants, further promoting renewable energy, and increasing energy efficiency. China has enacted a renewable energy act and an energy conservation law which provide mid-to-long-term targets for shifting to clean energy and sustainable development. The five-initiative plan is another important step in furthering these domestic agendas, and, hopefully, greater world action.

via Climate Law Blog » Blog Archive » U.S. – China Five Initiative Plan Will Foster Future Climate Actions.

Posted in carbon emission, China alert, Climate change, Ecology, Economics, Environment, GeoPolitics, Green, greenhouse gas, Pollution | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Barack Obama, China, climate, economic dialogue, environment, Greenhouse gas, greenhouse gas data, Sino-American relations, U.S.–China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, United States

22/07/2013

To Remain Tops in Innovation, the U.S. Needs Immigration Reform

BusinessWeek: “As China’s economy catches up with America’s in pure size, it’s worth asking whether China will eventually assume the top spot when it comes to innovation as well. The U.S. retains a strong global lead in research and new inventions, in large part because the U.S. continues to attract innovators from the world over—including from China. But to stay on top, the U.S. needs immigration reform that makes it easier for scientists and technology developers to come and stay in the country.

China is producing ever more science and technology graduates and climbing the global rankings in patent applications

China is churning out ever more science and technology graduates and climbing the global rankings in patent applications. By 2004 it was the fifth-largest producer of academic scientific publications—behind only the U.K., Germany, Japan, and the U.S. And in 2011, China’s ZTE (000063:CH) alone made 2,826 international patent filings—the most of any company in the world.

More global innovation is a good thing for everyone—so there’s no reason to fear China’s increasing technological heft. Regardless, that heft is still a fraction of America’s. According to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the U.S. is still first by a big margin in terms of widely cited articles—a measure of the quality of research. China ranks 17th. Per dollar of gross domestic product, the U.S. produces more than six times China’s number of patents that are filed in at least three different countries, which is an indicator of marketable innovation.

In 2012, China earned $1 billion in foreign royalty and license payments—this for intellectual property the country had created that was being exploited by companies elsewhere. Meanwhile, it paid $18 billion in royalty and license payments to foreign firms, for a total deficit of $17 billion. Compare that with the U.S., which ran a $82 billion surplus.

A new paper co-authored by Carsten Fink, chief economist of WIPO, suggests one big reason for the U.S.’s continued lead: The country remains a magnet for global innovators. Fink’s paper studies patent applications filed under WIPO’s Patent Cooperation Treaty, which records more than half of all international applications and lists the residence and nationality of the inventors of more than 4 million patents. Using that data, Fink and his colleague Ernest Miguelez found that in 2010 about 10 percent of inventors worldwide lived outside their country of nationality when making their international patent application. The proportion of international patent applications made from the U.S. by non-nationals was twice as high—around 20 percent. That proportion approximately doubled from 1985 to 2010, and it’s the highest share out of any large economy. It compares with a non-national share of international patent applications of about 2 percent in Japan and closer to 5 percent in Germany and France.

The U.S. is by far the biggest global net beneficiary of innovator migration. Between 2001 and 2010, 14,893 inventors with U.K. nationality applied for international patents while residing in the U.S., for example. And there were three times as many Chinese inventors in the U.S. than British ones. That illustrates the U.S. has done particularly well in attracting innovative talent from the developing world—more than half of the U.S. non-national innovator population comes from countries outside the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development club of rich countries.

Still, recent trends are disturbing. Duke University’s Vivek Wadhwa reports that the proportion of high-tech startups founded by Chinese and Indian immigrants in Silicon Valley dropped from 52 percent in 2005 to 44 percent in 2011, in part because more and more Indian and Chinese graduates of U.S. universities are returning home rather than dealing with the hassle of American immigration procedures. The U.S. is becoming less attractive to the very people who help power the U.S. innovation economy.

via To Remain Tops in Innovation, the U.S. Needs Immigration Reform – Businessweek.

Posted in China alert, Economics, innovation, Technology | Leave a Comment »

Tags: China, Duke University, intellectual property organization, Patent application, Patent Cooperation Treaty, Silicon Valley, technology graduates, United States, Vivek Wadhwa, World Intellectual Property Organization

19/06/2013

The yuan: The cheapest thing going is gone

The Economist: “After enduring a decade of criticism for its weakness, China’s currency now looks uncomfortably strong

TEN years ago, the yuan made its debut as a global economic bugbear. In June 2003, America’s then treasury secretary, John Snow, publicly encouraged China to loosen a policy under which its currency was pegged at 8.28 to the dollar. The next month four senators wrote an angry letter urging Mr Snow to investigate China for “currency manipulation”. The country was intentionally undervaluing its currency, argued Charles Schumer, a Democratic senator for New York. “The result is that everything they sell to other countries is the cheapest thing going.”

A decade later, Mr Schumer and other senators are still bashing the yuan: eight of them re-introduced a bill last week that would slap duties on currency manipulators. But much else has changed. Now allowed to float by 1% a day on either side of a reference rate set each morning by the central bank, the yuan closed trading on May 27th at 6.12 to the dollar, 35% stronger than its June 2003 rate. It has risen more against the dollar since March than it rose in the whole of last year, and its climb against Japan’s currency has been even steeper. Since November, when the markets began to anticipate dramatic monetary easing in Japan, the yuan has gained over 20% against a weakened yen.

China’s competitiveness on world markets depends not only on the price of its currency but also on the price of its goods and workers at home. The Bank for International Settlements calculates a “real” exchange rate for 61 economies that takes account of inflation differences between them. Since 2010 China’s real exchange rate, weighted by trade, has risen faster than any other, with the sole exception of Venezuela’s.

The price of labour is also rising faster in China than in its principal trading partners. The Economist has calculated an alternative “real” exchange rate, weighted by trade with America, the euro area and Japan, which takes account of unit labour costs in all four economies. By this measure, China’s real exchange rate has strengthened by almost 50% since Messrs Snow and Schumer began their currency-bashing ten years ago. If the yuan was the cheapest thing going back then, now its cheapness has all but gone. Some economists, such as Diana Choyleva of Lombard Street Research, even wonder if the yuan is now overvalued.”

via The yuan: The cheapest thing going is gone | The Economist.

China’s Currency Gains On Dollar (forbes.com)
Rising yuan lowering China’s exports (wantchinatimes.com)
China Names Yuan Convertibility Plan as Goal This Year – Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)
Meet the New Gold-backed World Reserve Currency (theburningplatform.com)

Posted in China alert, Economics | Leave a Comment »

Tags: Bank for International Settlements, Business, Central bank, China, economy, Exchange rate, Japan, Lombard Street Research, United States

18/06/2013

China: Iraq oil production booming, Venezuela lagging

After all that effort it seems that the US is helping China with Iraqi oil. Thank goodness it has fracking to bolster its own supplies.

Let China pump Iraq’s oil (economy.money.cnn.com)
Did China Win the Iraq War? (nationalreview.com)
China Reaps Biggest Benefits of Iraq Oil Boom (lunaticoutpost.com)
China is Getting Iraqi Oil, and the U.S. is Paying For It (oceansnrg.com)

Posted in China alert, Economics, GeoPolitics, oil & gas | Leave a Comment »

Tags: China, Iraq, List of companies of the People's Republic of China, middle-east, Oil reserves in Iraq, Saddam Hussein, United States

06/06/2013

China’s reverse imperialism – West contains China’s East, China moves West

I have a hypothesis that a country’s mindset mimics its national sports and games. See – https://chindia-alert.org/2012/04/03/does-a-countrys-mindset-mimics-its-national-games/

If I am correct, how can America with its football and baseball hope to compete in geo-politics with China’s Go and chess?All Posts

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

Tags: Beijing, China, Chindia, Geopolitics, India, Li Keqiang, United States

CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon

Chindia Alert: You’ll be Living in their World Very Soon

Categories

Blogs I Follow

Posts tagged ‘United States’

China supports U.N. investigation in Syria, urges caution

Critical similarities and differences in security structures of Asia and Europe

Japan’s Giant New Destroyer Sends A Clear Message To China, The World

Capability building in China

Capability building in China

Skill building must be rewards-based, rooted in real work, and tailored to local conditions.

1. Relate capability building to real activities

2. Instill incentives and create opportunities for promotion

3. Don’t forget China’s unique culture

About the authors

China’s brain drain may be world’s worst

U.S. – China Five Initiative Plan Will Foster Future Climate Actions

To Remain Tops in Innovation, the U.S. Needs Immigration Reform

The yuan: The cheapest thing going is gone

China’s reverse imperialism – West contains China’s East, China moves West

Tags

Creative Commons

Archives

Meta

Blog Stats

Chindia Alert: You’ll be Living in their World Very Soon

Categories

Blogs I Follow

Posts tagged ‘United States’

Capability building in China

Skill building must be rewards-based, rooted in real work, and tailored to local conditions.

1. Relate capability building to real activities

2. Instill incentives and create opportunities for promotion

3. Don’t forget China’s unique culture

About the authors

Related articles

Related articles

Tags

Creative Commons

Archives

Meta

Blog Stats