Innehållsförteckning för Vol.67/No.10 från Beijing Review

The annual sessions of the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee are China’s major political gatherings. The NPC and the CPPCC National Committee are, respectively, the highest state organ of power and top political advisory body and both have five-year terms. Their annual sessions, usually held in March, focus on the economic and social blueprint of the country for the coming year. The Second Session of the 14th CPPCC National Committee opened on March 4 and the Second Session of the 14th NPC opened on March 5, attended by approximately 2,100 members and 2,900 elected deputies, respectively. At the opening of the NPC session, Premier Li Qiang delivered the Report on the Work of the Government, which reviewed last year’s economic performance…

A battle is underway to determine which country will lead in the transition to zero-emission cars. The electric vehicle (EV) sector is expected to be a major pillar of the new green economy. Surprisingly, Germany, where the petrol-guzzling car was invented, is lagging. Meanwhile, China, where bicycles out-numbered cars just one generation ago, has become the world leader in EVs. On a recent visit to Germany, I was struck by how much Germans love their cars. They are rightly proud of their brands, from BMW to Volkswagen, for their quality and superior road handling. You don’t see many Japanese cars on the autobahns, let alone Chinese cars. So, when hawks in Brussels evoke a “China threat” to launch an anti-subsidy investigation into Chinese EV imports, it draws mostly yawns from…

The U.S. Government is viewing China-made port cranes as a modern-day Trojan horse clad in a steel exterior. On February 21, U.S. President Joe Biden signed an executive order authorizing the Department of Homeland Security and the Coast Guard to address the “cybersecurity threat” posed by Chinese cranes within the United States. He also proposed an investment of over $20 billion in the next five years to bolster crane production by PACECO Corp., a U.S.-based subsidiary of Mitsui E&S Co. Ltd. (Japan), to replace their Chinese counterparts. The order and the proposal were made in response to claims that cargo sensors used as part of the cranes’ normal operation could potentially be accessed by China and used to track goods entering and leaving the United States. Currently, more than 200…

The National Museum of China is celebrating the Year of the Dragon with an exhibition of its dragon-related artifacts in Beijing. The most striking exhibit is a jade dragon from the Neolithic Hongshan culture, which dates back to 5,000-6,000 years ago. Unearthed in Chifeng, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in north China, it is among the earliest representations of a dragon discovered in China. Exhibits on display range from the Neolithic Age to the early 20th century and are made from materials including bronze, jade, porcelain, gold, silver and lacquerware. The exhibition shows how the development of the dragon image has evolved from abstract and simple forms to more intricate forms reflecting complex spirituality. Dragons were a symbol of the monarch in ancient China and are still seen as auspicious bringers…

Having been elected as a deputy to the National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s top legislature that is elected for a term of five years and convenes once a year, for a second term last year, Min Xiaoqing once more finds herself in Beijing to attend the NPC’s annual session, which commenced on March 5. As principal of the Sixth Middle School in Tacheng City, northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, Min is bringing the people’s voices on education from Xinjiang to Beijing. Her proposals to the NPC sessions have always focused on the development of basic education. “I firmly believe that true equality and excellent education are timeless issues and aspirations that we should always strive for,” Min told Beijing Review. In her capacity as an NPC deputy, Min has…

The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) recently released its 2023 Report to Congress on China’s WTO Compliance, giving the Joe Biden administration’s assessment of China’s membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO). The report deliberately turns a blind eye to China’s fulfilled commitments while asserting that China’s economic and trading systems and policies pose challenges to global trade. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce condemned the report for its inaccuracy, with the focus of dispute being whether China has honored its WTO commitments. So what are the commitments China made to the WTO when it was admitted into the organization in December 2001? Its commitments are threefold: economic marketization, tariff reduction and intellectual property protection. In terms of marketization, before its WTO accession, China had already started to…

Late last year, Beijingers Sun Lijuan and her husband, both in their 60s, decided to book an apartment for no fewer than six months in Lingshui Li Autonomous County in China’s southernmost island province of Hainan and move there for the winter season. According to Sun, they are having the time of their lives. Sun was diagnosed with chronic joint pain a few years ago, and her husband has been suffering from respiratory problems for more than 10 years. So they decided to take advantage of tropical Hainan’s mild winter weather, with temperatures averaging around 20 degrees Celsius, to alleviate their symptoms. After all, strong scientific evidence has long indicated that sunlight is essential for people’s health. “Hainan’s air and temperature agree with us,” Sun told Beijing Review. “We’ve only…

As a big country, China’s economic and political influence is felt around the world. And, in recent years, its influence in the realms of education and culture has been growing too. The Confucius Institute, offering free language classes, has gained increasing popularity in both Hungary and Serbia. By offering opportunities to learn Chinese language and traditional arts such as painting, and hosting events to celebrate China’s holidays, like the Lantern Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival, Confucius institutes bring Chinese culture closer to interested learners, serving as bridges between nations. My own interest in China grew through participation in these classes and events. During my childhood, I held an unspoken fascination for Asian culture, a passion subtly cultivated through watching historical or comedy dramas such as those depicting the adventures of the…

SCIENTIST AWARDED FOR TRANSPLANT THERAPY Scientist Huang Xiaojun received the annual Distinguished Service Award from the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research on February 23. The award was given in recognition of his groundbreaking development of the Beijing Protocol, a method for conducting stem-cell transplants. The center is a research collaboration between the Medical College of Wisconsin and the U.S. National Marrow Donor Program. A member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and head of the Institute of Hematology at Peking University, Huang established a series of key techniques for bone marrow transplantation that gradually developed into the Beijing Protocol. The protocol has increased the three-year survival rate of leukemia patients receiving transplants from approximately 20 percent to about 70 percent. The protocol has been put into use…

Shen Aihong, born in 1974, has recently been serving a temporary position of deputy commissioner of the Qianxinan Buyi and Miao Autonomous Prefecture in the southwestern province of Guizhou starting from last October. This tenure is a secondment for gaining experience for her official position as vice chair of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) Committee of Yinchuan, capital of Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. Shen is also a member of the CPPCC National Committee, the top political advisory body. Drawing from her experience in Ningxia, where choy sum farming has flourished since 2006, Shen proposed that the CPPCC Ningxia Committee take the lead in establishing a platform to connect Ningxia-based businesses with opportunities in choy sum cultivation and other agricultural projects in Qianxinan. This initiative aims to strengthen agricultural…

Anything that can reduce conflict will help bring greater harmony to the world, former French President François Hollande said in a recent interview with Meng Liang, Beijing Review correspondent and Chairman of The Mencius Foundation. Similarly, former European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told Beijing Review that civilizations are inherently opposed to warfare. Edited excerpts of their remarks follow: François Hollande: The COVID-19 pandemic plus the conflicts in the world have, in a way, broken what was going on before these crises hit. Today’s global growth is weakened by the fact that world trade is not progressing as it did in the past. It’s true that for several months, there has been an upsurge in protectionism. In other words, world trade is in danger of being affected by protectionist, sanitary or…

The Chinese economy will grow beyond 5 percent this year if the government adopts more proactive fiscal and monetary expansion to stimulate domestic investment and consumption,  Justin Yifu Lin, renowned economist and Dean of Peking University’s Institute of New Structural Economics, said in a recent interview with China Daily. Edited excerpts of the newspaper’s report follow: Lin said that the nation’s annual growth rate in the coming decade has the potential to be 8 percent or higher, rebutting arguments that economic growth will continue to drop due to factors including demographic changes and the so-called balance sheet recession, as experienced by Japan. The theory of balance sheet recession, put forward by Richard Koo, chief economist of the Nomura Research Institute in Japan, describes a situation in which households and enterprises…

Xunshan Group, an aquatic product company in Weihai, a coastal city in Shandong Province, has employed a three-layered ecological breeding model. The upper layer grows algae such as kelp, the middle layer breeds shellfish such as abalone and scallops, and the lower layer raises fish and sea cucumbers. With this integrated multi-trophic aquaculture approach, multiple species are cultivated in proximity to create a more sustainable and balanced aquaculture system. Algae and other marine organisms are vital in capturing and storing carbon through biological carbon sequestration. Through photosynthesis, algae absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and transform it into organic compounds. When these marine plants and algae die, their organic matter sinks to the ocean floor, where it can be buried and stored for extended periods, effectively reducing the amount of…