Current Events

[eseum]

Read an article yesterday, that I can't put my hands on, that said China was going to do away with it's tariffs on U.S. pork and soy beans. There would be no other reductions in tariffs other than those two. That would help alleviate their pork problem in the short term. A year ago a Chinese company bought Smithfield Foods which is America's largest pork producer. It would also be interesting to see how much Chinese investment is taking place in American farmland with the current high rate of bankruptcy for farms here.

[Greg.D.]

"Then known as Shuanghui Group, WH Group purchased Smithfield Foods in 2013 for $4.72 billion, more than its market value."

 

The China Daily article doesn't say what the plan is but it may just be trying to out produce the virus, particularly in new farms in clean parts of the country. It can also be transmitted via feed which might explain a sudden desire for (clean) U.S. Soybean meal.

Edited December 8, 2019 by Greg.D. (see edit history)

[Randy W]

from the Shanghaiist on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/shanghaiist/posts/10158779549901030

 

3 people still missing after falling into massive, 38-meter deep sinkhole in Guangzhou

 

Shanghaiist

·

A subway line was under construction underneath the road.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

. . . and another in Xiamen

 

Drivers and passengers have lucky escape after hole swallows cars in southeast China

• Sinkhole suddenly opened up near subway station in city of Xiamen but no one is killed or injured
• Taxi driver whose vehicle was swallowed up says he and his passenger were able to pull themselves free unaided

 

 

 

It is the latest of a string of ground collapses involving subway projects in mainland cities this year.

The 500 square metre hole opened up just before 10pm on Thursday near Lucuo station in Xiamen, a city in Fujian province.

The city’s subway operator said no one had died or been injured in the accident and the people in the two cars had been able to get out on their own.

The accident also caused water pipes to burst, flooding the station.

 

 

[Randy W]

Police shooting in China - bystanders seem more interested in watching and recording the event than in taking cover. From the Shanghaiist



Cleaver-wielding man shot by police on street in downtown Shanghai

Seven shots were fired as pedestrians and motorists looked on from a dangerous angle

Several passersby filmed the stand-off. Their videos show police fanning out around the man with their weapons drawn and riot shields up. Meanwhile, the man appears to be holding a cleaver in one hand and a smaller knife in the other. He is wearing a winter jacket and hat.

While this is all happening, scooter and foot traffic continues to pass by on the other side of the road with a group of pedestrians also gathering to watch the events.

Eventually, the man starts waving around his cleaver and rushes toward one of the officers, causing police to open fire. It appears that police fire seven point-blank shots at the man who makes it all the way across the street before collapsing on the opposite sidewalk. One shot is fired after the man goes down, though it’s unclear if it connects.


The shots were fired in the direction of a number of motorists and pedestrians who were watching the scene.

[Randy W]

Only SEVENTEEN people left in Jiangsu - from the Sixth Tone

Chinese Province Lifts All but 17 People out of Poverty, Authorities Claim

. . . and this poor lady is apparently one of them

Quote

In an interview with The Beijing News, an unnamed official from Jiangsu’s poverty alleviation office insisted that the figure was accurate as of Dec. 31. “In another week, this statistic may change — some people will be lifted out of poverty, while others might return to poverty,” the official said. “However, there won’t be large fluctuations.” The official added that four of the 17 people were impoverished due to poor health.

 

According to a national standard, any individual in China earning less than 2,300 yuan ($331) annually — or around $1 a day — is considered impoverished, though Jiangsu’s provincial standard is 6,000 yuan. The World Bank’s poverty benchmark, meanwhile, is $1.90 a day, or just under $700 a year.

Edited January 13, 2021 by Randy W (see edit history)

[Randy W]

from the SCMP

 

 

Mainland Chinese spectators, participants ‘walk out’, names redacted as topic on Hong Kong democracy in world’s largest university debate causes stir

• World Universities Debating Championships in Bangkok cancels live stream midway over the motion ‘This House, as China, would grant universal suffrage to Hong Kong citizens’
• Winning team from University of Oxford requests for names to be redacted from tournament records

[Greg.D.]

Less interest in independent films one of the reasons cited (is total party mind control working?):

 

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3045420/mainland-chinese-spectators-participants-walk-out-names

 

China’s biggest independent film festival forced to suspend operations indefinitely

 

The China Independent Film Festival (CIFF), which provided a platform for films covering a range of sensitive topics that were not covered by mainstream festivals, released a statement on its official WeChat account on Thursday announcing that it would be suspended indefinitely after 17 years.

 

“We believe it is impossible to locally organise a film festival with a purely independent spirit, and even film festivals as a mechanism need to be reflected on,” it said.

 

................

 

Zhang Xianmin, a professor from Beijing Film Academy, has been its core organiser for 16 years.

 

“The closure is normal. We are just back to the usual rule under the party. We just went back to 20 years ago, when there was no room and opportunity for independent films.” Zhang told the South China Morning Post.

 

.............

The filmmaker recalled that when his film entered the festival in 2015, he found that getting a public screening was like “a guerilla fight” with all the movies being screened in different locations.

 

He also described the secrecy organisers had to adopt, deliberately putting the wrong address on fliers to avoid censorship.

 

When one of his films was first entered in the competition he was told to go to an address on the East Third Ring Road in Beijing but found there was nobody there when he arrived.

 

He called the organisers, who told him to go to a different floor, where he found a crowded conference room waiting to see the film.

 

The following year when his second film– about a severe nationwide police crackdown in the 1980s – was screened he was told to go to a burger restaurant in the capital and crawl into a storage area on the second floor, where his film was shown on a laptop.

[Greg.D.]

Yeh, yeh ...

 

China says won't change position on Taiwan after landslide election

 

TAIPEI (Reuters) - China will not change its position that Taiwan belongs to it and the world will only ever recognize that there is “one China”, Beijing said on Sunday after President Tsai Ing-wen won re-election and said she would not submit to China’s threats.

 

China’s ramped up efforts to get democratic Taiwan to accept Beijing’s rule under a “one country, two systems” model, as well as anti-government protests in Chinese-ruled Hong Kong, dominated the election campaign.

 

China says Taiwan is its territory. Taiwan says it is an independent country called the Republic of China, its formal name.

 

Tsai won another four-year term by a landslide, and her Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) also gained a majority in parliament.

[Randy W]

What happens after you finish digging a hole clear through to China

 

Six dead and four missing after sinkhole swallows bus in western China

• Boy pushes child from danger before falling into hole, reports say
• Authorities try to establish the identities of those killed when a section of busy road collapsed

[Randy W]

live action

 

[Randy W]

The battle over which flag to fly in America's Chinatowns

 

BBC

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-51129460

[Randy W]

 

China postpones year’s biggest political event amid coronavirus outbreak

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3050966/china-postpones-years-biggest-political-gathering-amid

[Greg.D.]

It would be an unacceptable risk if the Wuhan coronavirus spread among those people all in one hall. Don't let that hair dye fool ya: there are a lot of people over 60 in that bunch!

[Randy W]

It would be an unacceptable risk if the Wuhan coronavirus spread among those people all in one hall. Don't let that hair dye fool ya: there are a lot of people over 60 in that bunch!

 

I think it's planned for the end of May now, and is one reason why restrictions will remain in place, at least in Beijing.

[Randy W]

from the WSJ

 

McDonald's and KFC in the US and China

 

McDonald's Sticks With Chinese Meat Supplier

 

Yum Brands Inc., parent of KFC and Pizza Hut restaurants, on Wednesday said the company had dropped OSI as a supplier in China as well as in the U.S. and Australia. Yum said it reserved the right to take legal action against OSI, depending on the outcome of the Chinese government investigation.

 

The issue sprang to light on Saturday, when China's Dragon TV reported that OSI's Shanghai plant repackaged and sold chicken and beef past their sell-by dates. Since then, five employees at the Shanghai unit of Husi have been detained by authorities. In China, OSI has supplied restaurant chains including McDonald's, Yum and Burger King Worldwide Inc.

 

Shanghai Husi is owned by U.S.-based OSI Group Inc., a longtime McDonald's supplier.

 

OSI has been a long-time partner for McDonald's in China. It opened its first meat-processing facility in Beijing in 1992 just to serve the fast-food company as it introduced McNuggets and Big Macs to Chinese diners. Over the past 22 years, OSI expanded its operations largely in sync with McDonald's, which now runs more than 2,000 outlets in the country.

 

Last year, OSI opened its ninth and 10th plants in China, part of a $750 million investment to become one of China's biggest poultry producers, capable of processing more than 300 million chickens per year through complexes that include hatcheries, farms, feed mills and slaughterhouses.

 

Food-safety regulation has improved in recent years, but inspections and regulatory enforcement are fragmented by province and municipality.

 

The hardest to oversee are the small, individual farmers who still work with larger suppliers. In the past these small farms have created problems for companies such as Yum, which runs KFC and Pizza Hut chains across China. Yum stopped using small suppliers of chicken for its KFC outlets last year after problems with a supplier that allegedly used high levels of antibiotics, caused Yum's sales to tumble.

 

Suppliers like OSI have attempted to build farms and processing plants they fully control, from chick to chicken breast.

 

Tyson Foods Inc., which works with Yum in China, has been investing hundreds of millions of dollars in China to build its own fully controlled farms across the country.