Chinascope – Page 227

CCP Summit of World Political Parties

According to China’s official Xinhua News Agency, on July 6, Xi Jinping, head of Chinese Communist Party (CCP), attended the summit of the Chinese Communist Party and world political party leaders through video conferencing. Xi delivered a speech.

As part of the CCP’s 100 anniversary celebration, it was reported that more than 500 leaders of political parties and organizations from more than 160 countries, as well as more than 10,000 representatives of political parties attended the meeting. More than 100 countries’ political parties set up nearly 200 venues in their countries for their own party representatives to attend the summit remotely. The 160 countries included Russia, Spain, Vietnam, and others from Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

Source: Xinhua, July 7, 2021
http://www.xinhuanet.com/world/2021-07/07/c_1127628998.htm

Briefings | | July 7, 2021 | Geo-Strategic Trend

Vacancy Rate for China’s Commercial Office Space Nears Thirty Percent

Three major commercial office transactions have taken place in China in the past month. On June 28, Capital Land sold six Raffles City locations to Ping An Life Insurance for 9.6 billion yuan (US$1.5 billion). The week before, SOHO China sold 91 percent of its stock shares to the Blackstone Group for US$3 billion. On June 7, Hexie Health Insurance acquired SK Tower in Beijing for 9.06 billion yuan (US$1.4 billion). Three large commercial real estate transactions within 22 days totaled approximately 38 billion yuan (US$5.9 billion), a rare phenomenon in the industry. Insurance companies, asset managers and other institutions are acquiring commercial real estate in China at a moderate price.

According to statistics from the Beike Research Institute, a real estate industry think tank, the average annual growth rate of commercial office space over the past decade has exceeded 10 percent. By 2020, the total area of commercial business premises was 2.9 billion square meters (31 billion square feet). The estimate for sales of commercial real estate in 2021 approximates 2.6 trillion yuan (US$0.4 trillion).

Office buildings in China feature low rental yields, sloppy operations and high vacancy rates. In the second half of 2020, commercial office vacancy rates in first-tier cities were all above 20 percent, representing ten-year highs. The measure in Shanghai and Shenzhen even exceeded 25 percent. The national average vacancy rate for commercial office space is close to 30 percent.

Source: Central News Agency, July 2, 2021
https://www.cna.com.tw/news/acn/202107020087.aspx

Briefings | | July 7, 2021 | Economy/Resources

China’s One-Cent Masks Are Driving U.S. Manufacturers Nuts

Well-known Chinese news site Sina (NASDAQ: SINA) recently reported that many U.S. small personal protection equipment (PPE) vendors are having a hard time because of heavy competition. An example is mask manufacturer Premium-PPE. its mask sales dropped by 90 percent since last year, and only 50 of its 280 employees still remain employed. According to the American Mask Manufacturer’s Association (AMMA), all of its 26 member companies are expected to close down in the next 60 to 90 days. AMMA said this is the result of unfair trade competition from Chinese mask makers They are dumping one-cent masks into the U.S. market. Thousands of U.S. jobs will be at risk over the next two months. AMMA wrote to the Biden administration asking for the government to support “buy America” and for a ban on federal purchases of masks that do not meet American standards. AMMA plans to file an appeal to the WTO. However, the U.S. International Trade Administration refused to reveal whether the Administration will support this appeal or not.

Source: Sina, June 19, 2021
https://news.sina.com.cn/c/2021-06-29/doc-ikqciyzk2567453.shtml

Briefings | | July 6, 2021 | Economy/Resources US-China Relations

UDN: Ten Big Changes in Hong Kong after a Year of the HK National Security Law

United Daily News (UDN), one of the primary Taiwanese news groups, recently reported on ten major changes in the ten years since the Hong Kong National Security Law was imposed. In the past ten years, 117 political activists have been imprisoned. One out of every five Hong Kong residents is leaving the city and two of every five are considering it. The head of the police was promoted to Chief Secretary for Administration. This makes him the second in command in the Hong Kong government. Many members of the Legislative Council from the opposition parties were removed from the Council; common law principles have been questioned and foreign judges are leaving. Independent media companies such as Apple Daily have closed their doors. The annual Tiananmen Square Massacre memorial parade has been banned. The education contents in schools have changed while teachers are resigning. Numerous books, newspapers and movies have been censored. Foreign investors (such as Vanguard) are leaving, causing a drastic drop in office space rentals. Rob Chipman, former Chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong, said that move-outs of multinational corporate executives have increased by 30 percent. Some have been monitoring (the situation) since 2019 and concluded that, it appears now it is “about time to leave.”

Source: UDN, June 30, 2021
https://udn.com/news/story/7331/5568555?from=udn-catelistnews_ch2

Briefings | | July 6, 2021 | Geo-Strategic Trend

Global Times: South Korea’s Second “Quasi Aircraft Carrier” Officially Enters Service

Global Times recently reported that South Korea’s second amphibious assault ship Marado Island officially entered service on June 28, 14 years after the first ship Dokdo entered service. Marado Island has greatly improved based on lessons learned from the Dokdo. It is also armed with the latest equipment. Marado Island is 199.4 meters long and 31.4 meters high, and can carry around one thousand officers and soldiers. It can support the take-off and landing of five helicopters at the same time, and can also carry high-speed landing crafts as well as amphibious combat vehicles. Marado Island is equipped with four-sided fixed radar for the U.S. Aegis System and its detection and command capabilities have been further improved. The South Korean Navy stated that the Marado Island will conduct combat missions starting in October this year, after a formal evaluation of its operational capabilities.

Source: Global Times, June 29, 2021
https://mil.huanqiu.com/article/43jEDnL0odr

Briefings | | July 5, 2021 | Defense/Military Geo-Strategic Trend

China Will Have 40 million More Retirees over the Next Five Years

The 14th Five-Year Plan that China’s Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security recently released states that over the next five years, China will see an additional 40 million retirees and 35 million fewer people of working age. This poses a huge challenge for the pension system. This means an average of 8 million additional retirees per year, far more than the 4.5 million added last year.

The government made it clear earlier this year that it would gradually postpone the mandatory retirement age, sparking widespread concerns. The official Xinhua News Agency quoted experts who stated that people born during the “baby boom” in 1963 will soon become 60, leading to a rapid decrease in pension contributions and a dramatic increase in the number of recipients. China’s legal retirement age has stayed unchanged for nearly 70 years. It is 60 for men, 55 for female officials, and 50 for female workers.

China’s seventh population census shows that, last year, the proportion of people over 65 years old reached 13.5 percent of the total population.

Source: Radio Free Asia, July 2, 2021
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/Xinwen/3-07022021104522.html

Briefings | | July 5, 2021 | Economy/Resources

Chinese Communist Party Claimed 95 Million Members But Majority Joined for Personal Interests

The Central Committee Organization Department of the Chinese Communist Party announced that the total number of communist party members has exceeded 95 million while there are 4.864 million grassroots party organizations nationwide. The truth is, however, that anyone who wants to work for the government or as a public official must first join the party. The majority of the people who joined the party did so for their personal interests, not because of their belief in the communist ideology. Many college students who applied for party membership did so while they were still in school.

The statistics show that 23.677 million party members are aged 35 and below, accounting for 24.9 percent of the total number of party members. There are 49.513 million party members with college degrees or above, accounting for 52.0 percent of the total number of party members.

At the same time, the vast majority of criminal cases in China in recent years are related to corruption and bribery. Many of them are high-ranking officials. According to the official reports, from December 2012 to May of this year, the disciplinary inspection and supervision organs filed and investigated 392 officials who were at or above the provincial and ministerial level, 22,000 at the department and bureau level, more than 170,000 at the county department level, and 616,000 at the township department level.

Source: Radio Free Asia, June 30, 2021
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/zhengzhi/ql2-06302021093639.html

Briefings | | June 30, 2021 | Government/Politics

One-Third of New Academic Degrees in Chinese Universities Are in AI

China’s Ministry of Education recently announced a list of new majors (in 2021) to be included in the catalog of undergraduate programs in higher education institutions. Among the 37 new majors (departments), engineering related programs occupy the lion’s share. About one third of the new majors are in AI and electronic engineering, including intelligent surveillance engineering, intelligent mining engineering and quantum information science.

Since the end of 2020, the president of China, Xi Jinping, has repeatedly stressed the need to strengthen national science and technology forces, to enhance the capabilities of controlling the industrial supply chain and to solve the problem of “being strangled” in key technologies.

In addition to AI, China is also trying to accelerate the development of its own semiconductor industrial talents. 2020 saw the establishment of an Integrated Circuits University in Nanjing, also known as the first “chip university” in China. In early 2021, Anhui University is also setting up an IC (integrated circuit) college. The Shenzhen University of Technology in Guangdong Province established the School of Integrated Circuits in collaboration with China’s leading semiconductor company SMIC in June of this year.

Source: Radio Free Asia, June 30, 2021
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/Xinwen/5-06302021102334.html

Briefings | | June 30, 2021 | Information/Technology

Wu Guoguang: Xi Jinping’s Reversal of the Course, Will China’s Transition be Peaceful or Marked with Bloodshed?

Cheng Xiaonong: U.S.-China Strategic Relations Have Crystallized

Xinhua Commentaries: “Exposing the Three Major Political Deficits of the U.S.”

The CCP’s Performing Arts Troupes in the U.S.