According to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM), domestic vehicle sales increased 3% year-on-year in 2017, to 28.88 million units, a sales increase far lower than the 10% rise seen in 2016. The slower growth was due to higher taxes on smaller cars and subsidy adjustments on electric vehicles. Passenger car sales, led by Volkswage, increased 1.4% (among those SUV sales rose by 13.3%, to 10.25 million units), while sales of minibuses/multi-purpose vehicles plunged 20% and  ...

A Living History: Bound Feet Women in China By Jo Farrel,   A selection of images from this long-term project documenting some of the last remaining women in China with bound feet. A tradition that started during the Song Dynasty, foot binding was banned in 1911 but carried on through 1939 when women had the bandages forcibly removed. Although considered just for the elite, the majority of women in this documentation were farm workers from peasant families living in ...

The following article is reproduced here in it's entiety from the Center for Global Development   China’s Belt and Road Initiative – which plans to invest as much as $8 trillion in infrastructure projects across Europe, Africa, and Asia – raises serious concerns about sovereign debt sustainability in eight countries it funds, according to a new study from the Center for Global Development.     The study evaluated the current and future  ...

This June, China’s Ministry of Finance has unveiled a series of Draft Amendments to its individual income tax (IIT) Laws. These proposed changes are aimed at easing the tax burden for lower-income earners in particular, while taking a tougher stance on both foreigner workers and high-income earners. Below are summarized parts of the Draft Amendments that may affect foreign in China.     The effects of the proposed changes are fourfold:   ...

China has always been a huge consumer of beer (it is the world’s largest consumer and producer of beer), but tastes have recently been shifting away from masse produced beers, such as Snow, Qingdao and Budweiser to more premium and craft flavors. Sales volumes of cheaper Chinese beers have been falling—both Tsingtao and Yanjing posted losses in sales in 2016. However, demand for high-end beers is growing, and China’s market is ripe with opportunities for both domestic and fo ...

This past weekend Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi attended the two-day long 18th Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit, his 4th trip to China since he entered office. This will be India's first participation in the summit as a full-time member of the organization: India, along with Pakistan, became the full-time members during the Astana summit in June 2017.  With 8 members (India, Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan), the SCO represen ...

The sheer volume of information being generated in China is having a huge impact on how business operate in China. What was not possible to code and develop in China just 3 years ago, is now possibly, more efficient than coding and development in traditional locations such as the US and India. China’s ability to develop, search and hyperlinking technologies has risen exponentially. However, the challenge has now become one of attracting talent rather than searching for non-existent comp ...

By Saurav Bhattacharyya for China Brain.   When you are looking at optimizing your online presence in China, there’s really only one search engine to worry about; Baidu, which until recently claimed almost 80% of the search share. Last year it took a small dip when Qihoo, a local security vendor and internet provider, launched its own search engine, 360 Search and gained around 15% market share but it still handles 60-70% of all web searches in China.      ...

Located in the Pearl River Delta of South China, the Guangdong-Hong Kong and Macao Greater Bay Area is an agglomeration of cities and special administrative regions which serve as a must path for the routes leading to countries along the Belt and Road. The area is adjacent to the Beibu Gulf Economic Zone, southeast Asia and the vast central China urban agglomeration as well. It is a major international land and maritime corridor linking the hinterland of China and facing the ASEAN countries.  ...

China’s 19th Party Congress concluded with President Xi Jinping promising a rejuvenated China that wields more influence across the world. This declaration comes as the United States, erratic and unpredictable under Donald Trump, seems too preoccupied with turbulent domestic politics to care much about global engagement. In stark contrast to the West’s inward turn, Xi has defended globalisation and the need for global climate governance, and China is seizing this historic moment t ...

It is almost two years since Mobike co-founder Hu Weiwei put around 50 bicycles on the streets of Shanghai and drove away. Ofo had a similar beginning, spreading out shared bikes on Beijing’s university campuses. This is how China’s dockless bike rental economy was born.     Today, bikes are so bountiful that they are literally blocking the streets of Chinese cities. Although both companies have been hesitant to release numbers, the latest iResearch’s d ...

Want to sell a product or target visitors in China, in which case you will need a China server for your website. Whilst there are hundreds of hosting platform with a data center in USA, Europe, and Asia, you have limited choices in China. If you are looking to do business in China you really need to host your site locally to ensure speed of user access, Regulatory compliance, better search engine rankings and to ensure that your site is withing the Great Chinese Firewall. Lastly  ...

Once you’ve set up your own company, you can start to hire Chinese staff, but to do that you’ll need to register them for China’s social welfare programs. Here’s an introduction to some of the rules concerning the recruitment of Chinese labor: whereas hiring foreign staff requires one to apply to the authorities to get them a work visa and work permit, and you are automatically eligible to hire Chinese as soon as you finish registering your employees’ social welf ...

By Paul Ross.     On the 573, an empty seat doesn’t stay empty for very long, even if the seat is next to another one that is also empty. If you want one of them, you have to move fast otherwise one of your fellow passengers will most certainly get there first. And when he does, I can guarantee that he will take the outside seat, effectively blocking access to the seat unoccupied.      Grabbing the aisle seat like that while leaving  ...

The sheer growth and scale of China’s economy in a global context can be difficult to visualise. An economy which is expected to overtake that of the US by the end of the decade can be difficult to put into perspective. While Chinese GDP has slowed in recent years, its is still growing at a remarkable scale and is perhaps the most important international event since the end of the Cold War. We believe the two graphics below help you to understand this growth phenomenon    ...

By Daniel Addyson.   The Chinese healthcare system is struggling to provide adequate medical access for its 1.4 billion citizens. But the Chinese may have already have built the foundation for sustainability: their love of mobile technology.     Getting medical care in China     For a westerner visiting a Chinese hospital for the first time, it’s an eye-opening and sometimes mind-boggling experience. During the few trips ...

Last week saw The Communist Party of China (CPC) unveiled a new leadership line-up for the next 5 years. Xi Jinping was again elected general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, leading its seven-seat Political Bureau Standing Committee. The other six members of the top leadership are Li Keqiang, Li Zhanshu, Wang Yang, Wang Huning, Zhao Leji and Han Zheng. For the first time, all Standing Committee members of the Political Bureau were born after the founding of the People's Republic o ...

Two of the world’s most densely populated regions, northern India and northern China, are experiencing high levels of groundwater depletion, according to a 2015 study sponsored by NASA. For these and many other highly stressed aquifers, natural replenishment through precipitation is unable to offset human-led extraction, threatening water quality and supply sustainability. Three notable cases are the Ganges River and Indus Basin (both in India), and the North China Aquifer. Given th ...