Highlighted links for Tuesday, October 4, 2022

Below are links to other noteworthy reports published in the last 24 hours from and about China.

BUSINESS AND TECHNOLOGY:

Can India challenge China as smartphone maker for the world?
Apple iPhone exports from India doubling in boon to Modi’s plan / Bloomberg (paywall)
“Apple Inc.’s iPhone exports from India crossed $1 billion in the five months since April, according to people familiar with the matter, signaling the South Asian nation is making progress with its bid to become a force in electronics manufacturing.”

Storing electricity as compressed air
China blowing hot on compressed air energy storage / Asia Times
“Nearly a quarter of China’s excess power will be stored as compressed air by 2030 but regulatory and technical hurdles remain.”

Property problems pervade
China’s property crash: ‘A slow-motion financial crisis’ / FT (paywall)

Can boycotted H&M win back Chinese consumers?
H&M ‘cautiously positive’ about China after consumer boycott / FT (paywall)

Very few Japanese retailers in China have managed to stay on top
As politics swayed Japanese retailers in China, few have had lasting success / Japan Times
“In the 1990s, Japanese retailers rushed to launch operations in China, a huge market with a population of some 1.2 billion people at the time. But only a few have been able to succeed.”

Be the first to rent BYD electric vehicles in Europe
Sixt agrees to purchase around 100,000 e-vehicles from China’s BYD / Channel NewsAsia
“Sixt has committed to buying around 100,000 electric vehicles from China’s BYD in the coming years under a new partnership agreement signed by the two companies, the German car rental company said on Tuesday.”

Credit Suisse’s Hong Kong bankers are dropping like flies
Credit Suisse loses five more private bankers in Hong Kong / Bloomberg (paywall)
“Credit Suisse Group AG is struggling to halt departures from its private bank in Hong Kong, with more recent resignations amid the turmoil at the Swiss lender.”

China and India are overflowing with billionaires
Asia has over 950 billionaires, outnumbering all other regions / Nikkei Asia (paywall)
“Rich Asians are becoming more common, particularly in China and India.”

A porcelain Chinese vase worth almost $8 million
‘Ordinary’ Chinese vase valued at €2,000 sells for almost €8 million after bidding war / Guardian
“Tianqiuping-style porcelain sells for nearly 4,000 times its estimated value after buyers are convinced it is a rare artifact.”

SCIENCE, HEALTH, AND ENVIRONMENT:

Hong Kong eases up on COVID curbs by relaxing airline crew rules
Hong Kong allows airline crews to leave hotels on overseas trips / Bloomberg (paywall)
“Hong Kong’s government has eased COVID-related restrictions on the movements of locally based crew when making overseas trips, on which the territory’s strict rules had previously confined them to their hotels.”

Social stigmas against people who have caught COVID in China
After COVID, another kind of isolation / World of Chinese
“As the country continues to deploy strict control measures to prevent the spread of the virus, and the vast majority of China’s 1.4 billion people have neither been infected nor know anyone who has had the virus, those who have been infected face stigma and discrimination in everything from regular COVID testing and employment opportunities, to dating prospects and purchasing tickets for sports events, months or even years after their recoveries.”

Hainan Island again turns vacations into COVID-curbed nightmares
Chinese resort city slaps ‘golden week’ tourists with new COVID-19 restrictions / SCMP (paywall)
Tourists visiting Sanya have started to flee the vacation destination, after authorities ordered travelers to take PCR tests or risk a yellow health code that restricts their movements.

POLITICS AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS:

Africa’s debt to China pales compared with its debt to other global creditors
African countries don’t owe China as much money as many people think / China-Global South Project (paywall)
“While the debt crisis in many African countries steadily worsens, there is a widespread perception, both in Africa and the West, that Chinese loans are to blame. But new research from Development Reimagined reveals that Chinese debt obligations on the continent are actually much smaller than what African countries owe to other international creditors.”

China wants to know the building layouts rented by foreign diplomats in Hong Kong
China demands foreign diplomats provide floor plans of Hong Kong missions / FT (paywall)
“China has demanded the floor plans of all properties rented by foreign missions in Hong Kong, in a move diplomats believe reflects Beijing’s paranoia about overseas interference in the Asian financial hub’s turbulent politics.”

Indonesia rolls out high-speed train cars, made in China
Indonesia presents China-made high-speed train cars / Nikkei Asia (paywall)
“Indonesia has presented in public the cars of the country’s first high-speed train connecting the capital Jakarta with Bandung, a major city in West Java, with commercial operations expected to start in June 2023.”
Xi Jinping, Joko Widodo to test Indonesia’s China-made high-speed train after G20 meeting in Bali / SCMP (paywall)

Things aren’t so peachy between China and India
China has lost India / Foreign Affairs
Tanvi Madan, a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, writes: “The appearance of rapprochement between China and India obscures real ruptures…India’s domestic and foreign policies have shifted in significant ways in response to the perceived threat of China, and any restoration of the prior status quo in the bilateral relationship is unlikely.”

Xi and the Chinese Communist Party’s big political reshuffle
China’s 20th Party congress: An upside scenario / Diplomat
Prospect of ‘Chairman Xi’ fuels debate as China Party congress nears / Nikkei Asia (paywall)

China’s patriotic anthems reverberate through a Congolese mining town
Sicomines’ expat staff in the DRC mark China’s National Day with a patriotic song competition / China-Global South Project (paywall)
“230 expatriate staff members from the Congolese joint venture mining giant Sicomines gathered over the weekend in the Congolese mining city of Kolwezi to celebrate the Chinese National Day holiday with a patriotic song competition.”

Consequences from the U.S.’s now-shuttered China Initiative live on
Increasing number of Chinese researchers leaving the U.S. out of fear, study says / NextShark via Yahoo News
“A new study [by the Asian American Scholar Forum (AASF)] suggests the number of Chinese researchers relocating to China from the United States is increasing despite the end of the controversial China Initiative earlier this year.”

Solomons wedged between the U.S. and China
Solomon Islands agreed to accord after China references axed / AP
“Solomon Islands agreed to sign an accord between the United States and more than a dozen Pacific nations only after indirect references to China were removed, the Solomon Islands foreign minister said Tuesday.”

Chinese nationals face growing kidnapping threats in the DR Congo
China sends high-level public security bureau official to DR Congo for talks on how to better protect Chinese nationals / China-Global South Project (paywall)
“The Chinese government recently dispatched a high-ranking member of the powerful Ministry of Public Security (MPS) to the Democratic Republic of the Congo for talks with security officials on how to better protect Chinese nationals in the country.”

SOCIETY AND CULTURE:

Freelance work is more a necessity than a choice for young Chinese
Spurning work as ‘soulless robots’, young Chinese want flexibility / SCMP (paywall)
“More than 200 million people in China work as freelancers, with more than 16% of fresh graduates categorizing themselves as such last year…But the trend towards freelance work is also being driven by necessity, with young Chinese entering a dismal job market in a weakening economy.”

China’s retired elderly are keeping the economy running
As China’s economy stutters, the elderly are emerging as big spenders / Sixth Tone
“Insulated from the economic slowdown, retirees have become the driving force of China’s struggling tourism industry.”

Social media users are up in arms about the price of corn
The price is not right: Corn controversy takes over Chinese social media / What’s on Weibo

LGBTQ discrimination in Hong Kong
Majority of younger Hongkongers support LGBTQ+ equality, but discrimination still common, survey finds / HKFP
“Almost half of those surveyed said they had experienced, witnessed, or heard about discriminatory behaviour against the LGBTQ+ community, with nearly 60%of the cases being in the form of verbal abuse.”

Queer Chinese weddings on Zoom
Same-sex couples from China are getting married in Utah over Zoom / Rest of World
“Utah County introduced weddings over Zoom during the pandemic, unintentionally providing a valuable service for China’s LGBTQ+ community.”

Hopes turn into anxieties under China’s Xi
New anxieties disturb Beijing neighborhood living Xi’s Chinese Dream / SCMP (paywall)
“In the decade since China’s president laid out his vision for prosperity, life has been good for the residents of Shangdi but expectations are changing, with potentially profound implications for the future.”

So! Many! Noodles!
Sample noodles from across China / NYT (paywall)
“The online retailer Mala Market brings back a popular sampler pack of regional noodles, a memoir with a cassoulet angle, and more food news.”