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Sichuan Hospital Job Listing Requires Nurses to Have Master’s or Doctoral Degree

West China Second Hospital recently posted a job ad seeking 34 nurses. Surprisingly, the job posting required that applicants possess a master’s or PhD degree. Typically, nursing roles in mainland China require only an undergraduate degree.

Fierce competition for jobs in China has led to “degree inflation,” with a spiraling trend of employers demanding higher and higher qualifications from job applicants. This year saw a record 4.74 million people take China’s graduate school entrance exam, up from only 2.38 million in 2018. In Beijing there are now over 160,000 individuals who hold a master’s or doctoral degree, surpassing for the first time the roughly 130,000 people in Beijing who hold only an undergraduate college degree. Similar trends are happening across China.

Some Chinese netizens reacted strongly to the Sichuan hospital’s job posting on social media, expressing outrage or lamenting over what they saw as increasingly unrealistic academic requirements for jobs.

Source: Central News Agency (Taiwan), November 14, 2023
https://www.cna.com.tw/news/acn/202311140329.aspx

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

2023 World Association for Performing Arts Convenes in Beijing

A report in China’s state newspaper People’s Daily stated that the 2023 World Association for Performing Arts (WAPA) and the Beijing Forum for Symphonic Music launched in Beijing on November 13. Over 300 representatives from 187 international art institutions in 30 countries gathered to “discuss new developments and challenges facing symphonic activities worldwide.”

According to People’s Daily, WAPA is an international, professional, non-profit organization voluntarily formed by theaters, cultural groups, art schools, and other performing arts institutions. It is headquartered in Beijing with its secretariat at the National Center for the Performing Arts (NCPA). WAPA aims to “build an open exchange platform to promote outstanding performing arts, strengthen technology integration, and encourage civilizational exchange and common prosperity.”

NCPA President Wang Ning, also the Chair of WAPA, said that the NCPA has long promoted cultural integration and Sino-foreign communication, and that the NCPA will continue working with global institutions to support WAPA in organizing activities and weaving “a spiritual bond of beauty and commonality in the global performing arts.”

Cormac Sims, Administrative Director of the British Royal Opera House, applauded WAPA’s initiative as “an important link between countries.” He looks forward to “making more progress together.”

WAPA regularly organizes forums on performing arts and symphonic music. The 2023 Beijing Forum for Symphonic Music has the theme “Seeking New Horizons, Sharing and Coexistence.” Discussions will focus on music education and audience expansion, contemporary symphonic music visions, and co-creation platforms. Artists and industry leaders will address symphonic music developments and promote global exchange and mutual understanding.

Source: People’s Daily, November 14, 2023
http://paper.people.com.cn/rmrb/html/2023-11/14/nw.D110000renmrb_20231114_2-04.htm

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry Confirms China’s MSS Hacked Presidential Office

South Korea’s newspaper of record Dong-a Ilbo reported that China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS) hacked the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs last January and leaked 4.5GB of emails. The hacking took place during former President Moon Jae-in’s presidency. South Korean authorities admitted that the attack came from China and said that the MSS also infiltrated the computer network at Korea’s Blue House presidential office.

The Dong-A Ilbo report quoted a South Korean government source saying that an investigation by Korea’s National Intelligence Service concluded that MSS was behind the attack. To pull off the hack, the MSS exploited vulnerabilities in spam-blocking equipment. This gives South Korea strong evidence that China was trying to steal confidential information regarding Korea’s government and presidential office.

Korea’s foreign ministry confirmed that emails were leaked but said they “did not contain any secrets” and were mostly personal spam. However, the Korean investigation found evidence that the MSS attempted to go further with its hacking, “trying to invade the [Korean] Wa Dae computer network to gain access to confidential documents from the South Korean Ministry of National Defense.” According to the article, the South Korean government has been aware of the hacking since January 2022. An ally notified South Korea through intelligence channels that there were signs of Chinese hackers breaching the foreign ministry, and the incoming Yoon administration immediately investigated.

Analysts suggest the vulnerability to cyber-attacks may have been a motivating factor behind President Yoon’s decision to move the Korean presidential residence from the historic Blue House to the Ministry of Defense Building.

Source: Radio Free Asia, November 10, 2023
https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/news/kr-hacker-11102023020930.html

Briefings | | |   Defense/Military

CCP Reform Committee Calls for Optimization of State-Owned Enterprises

The 3rd meeting of China’s Central Committee for Comprehensively Deepening Reform of the Chinese Communist Party was held on November 7th. Directives from the meeting stressed the importance of “optimizing the layout of state-owned enterprises, strengthening supervision of monopolistic industries, improving the state capital operating budget system, and emphasizing fiscal discipline.” The Committee is chaired by Xi Jinping, who presided over the meeting.

Other dictates resulting from the Committee’s meeting include:

  • The state capital operating budget is important and should be improved to expand its scope, strengthen its functions, better manage revenue and spending, and increase fund effectiveness.
  • Adhere to Party leadership and fully utilize the [Chinese] system’s advantage of concentrating resources on major initiatives. The goal is to optimize the distribution and structure of state-owned enterprises, concentrating state capital in key national security industries, public services, emerging strategic industries, and improving people’s livelihoods. This will allow state enterprises to better align with national strategies.
  • For natural monopoly industries like electric power, oil, gas and rail, regulation should focus on ensuring that those industries fulfill national security duties, social responsibilities, and business scope limits.

The Committee meeting reiterated the principle of “overcapacity reduction” and the idea of “living a tight life” fiscally. It called for strengthening budgetary constraints, promoting performance management, rationalizing revenues and expenditures, improving people’s livelihoods, and ending extravagance and waste.

Source: Central News Agency (Taiwan), November 7, 2023
https://www.cna.com.tw/news/acn/202311070369.aspx

Briefings | | |   Government/Politics

Local Governments’ Illegal Debts Highlight Fiscal Strain on China

China’s Ministry of Finance disclosed eight cases of illegal debt held by local governments, highlighting the seriousness of local debt issues facing the country. Since 2018, local governments have violated national-level policy by forcing state-owned enterprises and banks to advance billions of yuan in funds for urban development, infrastructure projects, and other expenditures that should have been funded by municipal or provincial budgets instead. This has created tens of billions of yuan in “hidden debt” in certain cities.

Examples include Hubei Province’s creation of 21.48 billion yuan (US$2.95 billion) in hidden debt through land development projects, Guangxi Province’s 17.7 billion yuan (US$2.43 billion) of debt for land projects, and Shaanxi Province’s 2.6 billion yuan (US$360 million) for a conference center. Other cases involved hundreds of millions of yuan in illegal advances for flood relief and other spending.

Banks were found complicit in the practice, with the Agricultural Development Bank of China’s Shaanxi branch illegally providing 1.3 billion yuan (US$180 million) that went toward river management projects in Xi’an. The Agricultural Bank’s Wuhu branch was found to have illegally loaned 471 million yuan (US$64.7 million) to the local government.

China’s Finance Ministry released information about these cases to hold local officials and banks accountable and warn others against engaging in the practice. The release highlights the financial difficulties faced by local governments, where even basic infrastructure and public works spending has required procurement of illegal hidden debt, typically via shell companies owned by the local government.

Beijing’s attempt at introducing accountability through publicity will likely be insufficient to resolve the issue absent more comprehensive reforms.

Source: Central News Agency (Taiwan), November 6, 2023
https://www.cna.com.tw/news/acn/202311060331.aspx

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

Plummeting Fertility in China Likely to Sustain Population Decline into Next Century

China’s birth rate has fallen sharply, leading to negative population growth that is likely to continue into the next century, according to Chinese economists. This will not only affect the labor supply but also slow economic growth. Zuo Xuejin, former Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences executive, said at a recent economic forum that coping with demographic changes and creating high-quality growth [in the Chinese economy] would require speeding up the country’s transition to a demand-centric economy and increasing investment in human capital.

Since the country’s total fertility hit a record low in 2022, China’s various policies aimed at increasing the birth rate have met with limited success. Experts believe negative population growth will persist as fertility remains far below the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman. Modeling shows that, even with optimistic assumptions regarding a rebound in fertility, China’s population decline could continue through 2097. If current lower fertility rates continue, negative growth may persist into the 2100’s.

The urban concentration of population and economic activity in major coastal and inland city clusters will continue even as cities face depopulation. Local governments would do well to avoid wasted infrastructure investment in the face of population decline.

Source: Central News Agency (Taiwan), November 5, 2023
https://www.cna.com.tw/news/acn/202311050119.aspx

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

Japanese Embassy in China Received 1 Million Harassing Phone Calls

During the two months following the start of wastewater discharge by Tokyo Electric Power’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, the Japanese embassy in Beijing has received approximately 1 million harassing phone calls from within China. The Japanese government asked China to address the situation as it was interfering with the embassy’s normal operations, but the problem persists.

The embassy investigated the calls and found that over 40,000 of them were made on August 25th, the day after discharge into the Pacific Ocean began. The volume of harassing phone calls decreased by the end of August. At present, the embassy is still receiving about 10,000-15,000 such calls per day.

Most of the calls involve verbal abuse, silence, or explicit threats against Japan or the Japanese embassy (e.g. threatening to “blow up [the embassy]”). The embassy documented malicious phone numbers and reported them to China’s public security authorities.

At a Japan-China relations forum on October 20th, Ambassador Hideo Tarumi acknowledged the harassing calls and said “rationality” was needed to advance bilateral relations.

Chinese law stipulates that frequent harassing calls interfering with normal life can incur legal liability.

Source: Kyodo News, October 27, 2023
https://china.kyodonews.net/news/2023/10/80198c16ac64.html

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend

CCP’s Financial Work Conference Emphasizes Risk Prevention

The Central Financial Work Conference was held in Beijing on October 30-31. The meeting, held every 5 years, sets the direction for China’s major financial reforms and policies. This year’s conference comes amid a slumping Chinese economy, real estate crises, local debt issues, and financial sector troubles.

The meeting emphasized strengthening financial supervision to effectively prevent and resolve risks, including establishing mechanisms to address local debt and optimizing government debt structures. It highlighted promoting healthy real estate financing, regulating foreign exchange and maintaining RMB stability, overseeing financial markets to prevent cross-border risk contagion, and coordinating financial regulators.

Xi Jinping delivered an important speech summarizing financial work since 2012, analyzing the financial situation, and laying out current and future policy priorities. The conference also aimed to promote a positive cycle in finance and real estate, strengthen foreign exchange management, prevent financial market risks, and coordinate financial regulators.

The meeting was originally scheduled for 2022 but postponed to this year. The last meeting was held in 2017. According to recent reports, He Lifeng has taken over as director of the CCP Central Finance and Economics Office.

The Central Financial Work Conference is the highest profile meeting on China’s financial system. Held every 5 years since 1997, each conference sets the tone for major financial reforms and policies in China. This year’s meeting comes amid serious economic slump and financial sector instability.

Source: Radio Free Asia, October 31, 2023
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/Xinwen/10-10312023155932.html

Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources