Space exploration, 'over(under?)capacity', a snowy summit
Selection of China backgrounds | perspectives | context | news
China21 Journal selects a number of publications every week for more background, perspective, context or news on China.
#space-exploration #space-program
Chinaโs space exploration has been busy lately
The ๐ฆ๐ต๐ฒ๐ป๐๐ต๐ผ๐-๐ญ๐ณ ๐๐ฝ๐ฎ๐ฐ๐ฒ๐ฐ๐ฟ๐ฎ๐ณ๐ ๐ฟ๐ฒ๐๐๐ฟ๐ป๐ฒ๐ฑ ๐๐ผ ๐๐ฎ๐ฟ๐๐ต, landed in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region on Tuesday April 30 with astronauts Tang Hongbo, Tang Shengjie and Jiang Xinlin. The three astronauts operated Chinaโs Tiangong space station since October 2023. Their return came 5 days after the Shenzhou-18 spacecraft mission docked at Tiangong space station on April 25 with a new three-member crew, Li Guangsu, Li Cong and Ye Guangfu. China commenced building its own space station with the first module launch in 2021 after being excluded from the International Space Station and has been expanding since.
Image credit : Xinhua news
Image credit : Xinhua news
On May 3rd, China launched world-first mission to collect samples from the far end of the moon. The Long March-5 rocket was launched early morning from Wenchang Space Launch Center on Hainan island with the 8 metric ton Chang'e-6 probe. The unmanned spacecraft will be on a nearly two-month mission with scheduled landing on the South Pole-Aitken Basin which always faces away from the Earth. The mission goal is to retrieve rocks and soil from the far side of the moon which has never been done before.
Image credit : CGTN
Another milestone in recent space exploration was the release of the Geologic Atlas of the Lunar Globe on April 21 by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. It is the first high-definition lunar geologic atlas in the world with accurate details at a scale of 1:2.5 million.
The Moon Atlas, which took more than 100 researchers over a decade to compile, reveals a total of 12.341 craters, 81 bassins and 17 rock types, along with other basic geological information about the lunar surface.
Image credit : Nature
Available in both Chinese and English, the atlas is drawn and verified based on scientific exploration data from various spacecraft missions of the Changโe project, China's Lunar Exploration Program (launched in 2004).
The Academy also released a book called Map Quadrangles of the Geologic Atlas of the Moon, comprising 30 sector diagrams which together form a visualization of the whole Moon.
The atlas is work in progress, improving the resolution and accuracy of the maps to scientific and engineering needs. In the meantime, the completed atlas has been integrated into a cloud platform called the Digital Moon, and will eventually become available to the international research community.
The new atlas will put existing moon maps dating from the 1960s and 1970s (based on data from the US Apollo missions) to historical archives.
Read more about the Geologic Atlas of the Lunar Globe in scientific journal Nature : โChina's Moon atlas is the most detailed ever madeโ
#xi-macron #china-france
Snowy summit : Presidents Macron and Xi in the French Pyrenees
Image credit : Xinhua news
French President Emmanuel Macron invited Chinese President Xi Jinping on May 7 to the Tourmalet Pass in the French Pyrenees mountains, where Macron spent time during his childhood visiting his grandmother.ย
Macron and Xi โ together with their wives, Brigitte Macron and Peng Liyuan โ drove up the winding roads and visited a traditional mountain resort amidst light snowfall.ย
Image credit : La Depeche
The mountain visit came after Xi Jinpingโs visit to Paris where both Presidents agreed on signing four joint statements. They also held a trilateral meeting, along with President of the European Commission Ursula Von der Leyen, covering the Ukraine and Palestine crises and โovercapacityโ (read more about the overcapacity issue here below). Mainstream media in the West has not been shy of op-eds about Xiโs real intentions of his Europe visit which also includes Serbia and Hungary, ranging from โseeking strategic opportunityโ to โdivide and conquer tacticsโ.
Instead of more op-eds, find in China Inside article below the translation of the four main joint statements made between France and China, on the situation in the Middle East, biodiversity, AI and global governance, and agricultural cooperation.
And find Xi Jinping's letter published in French newspaper 'Le Figaro' last Sunday (May 5) ahead of his visit to France, translated into English here. A brief extract from the letter :
โConfucius observed that "a man of true moral integrity is one who is both friendly but independent, and who does not compromise his principles, and who is independent without any bias or taking sides. How unflinchingly firm he is in his strength!" French writer Romain Rolland said that "it is so much easier to allow oneself to be guided than it is to think for oneself. This abdication is the kernel of the mischief." Both China and France value independence as two major countries.โ
#global-economy #overcapacity
โOvercapacityโ : Westโs latest accusation against China
Both US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and US Secretary of State Anony Blinken visited Beijing in recent weeks and on top of the agenda lecturing China was about its overcapacity distorting the global market balance. President of the European Commission Ursula Von der Leyen reiterated the accusation during the trilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, French President Macron and herself last week in Paris.
The overcapacity accusation is especially about the โnew threeโ of Chinaโs exports: new energy vehicles (NEVs, including electric and hybrid vehicles), lithium batteries and photovoltaic products.
Both the United States and European Union are simply saying โChinaโs overcapacity in these sectors results in dumping goods at low prices in overseas markets, putting high risks at industries, businesses and jobs in their markets.
Two recent articles were published considering this accusation. Lance Gore, Senior Fellow at the East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore outlines in his article Why โovercapacityโ is a vague and misleading term (ThinkChina, May 3, 2024) two reasons why this accusation is false. While Gore acknowledges excessive capacity has been a problem for China due to its governance system, he mentions this applies for labour-intensive products of traditional industries and lagging technologies, not the โnew threeโ the West is accusing China of.
Compared to traditional industries which are exported in large quantities due to overcapacity, the โnew threeโ are different in at least two ways.
First, the positive spillover benefits of the โnew threeโ cannot be ignored. Their rapid development and export contribute to Chinaโs economic growth and the worldโs green development and low-carbon transformation. The International Energy Agency (IEA) has said that such high-quality production capacities cannot be considered overcapacity, as they are important in tackling climate change and propelling global development of NEVs.
If all the combustion engine vehicles on the roads in the world were to be replaced by NEVs, its production capacity would not be in excess but severely deficient. The US Foreign Policy magazine has published an analysis that Yellen has a โthree-body problemโ with China, and that her criticism of Beijingโs industrial overcapacity is unconvincing.
Second, the โnew threeโ are industries of the fourth industrial revolution, mainly driven by new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), digitalisation and information technology, allowing them to achieve exponential growth, with much more rapid emergent enterprises spawned by the new technological revolution, production capacities are largely concentrated within a few enterprises or nations.
To fully take advantage of their production capacities and technologies, these enterprises must think global and aim at the global market, as illustrated by the Apple iPhone and Tesla EVs that are produced in China by US enterprises; it is difficult to link such companies to overcapacity.
For example, despite its short history, the number of spacecraft launches by SpaceX has very rapidly ranked among aerospace superpowers such as the US, China, Russia and Europe. Driven by rapid growth and constant innovations, SpaceXโs costs of spacecraft launches have dropped sharply, yet no one accuses it of overcapacity. Some Chinese enterprises, such as Huawei and BYD, are in a similar situation.โ
โWhile accusing China of providing government subsidies to support its industries, the US and other developed nations are themselves providing similar support through their industrial policies. In this post-globalised era, such accusations would seem increasingly pathetic and weak.
โOvercapacityโ is a vague and misleading term, while the โcapacity politicsโ it engenders has made Yellen, an expert economist, openly disregard the basic economic theory that international trade will cease if every nation only produces to meet its consumption needs.โ
Read more in Lance Goreโs article
Image credit : China Daily - EV GAC Aion factory in Guangzhou, Guangdong province
Then what are the Westโs accusations really about ?
Warwick Powell, Adjunct Professor at the Queensland University of Technology and Senior Fellow at the Taihe Institute, made the same two conclusions in his article โTime to Look in the Mirrorโ (Warwicksโs Substack, April 11, 2024) as Lance Gore; the โthree newโ global capacity is less than the rapidly growing demand and secondly there would be no trade at all if every nation just produces what they would domestically need.
Powell elaborates as follows:
โAs a sign of this (capacity-demand discrepancy), Chinese EV manufacturers are already actively expanding their manufacturing capabilities in other countries. Chinese EV manufacturers are investing in factories in other parts of the world to service markets. They are already establishing factories in Hungary, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Mexico and Brazil. These investments will contribute to greater spatial balance, creating development opportunities for these countries.โ
Powell confirms as well the weak accusation of Chinese government subsidy, indicating the EU policies of industry subsidies . With regard to lower costs, he adds โcutthroat price competition is a feature of Chinese economic practice. The rapid growth in industrial automation is also a reality, underpinning the growth in productivity we are seeing in EV manufacturing.โ
In the article, Powell also critically addresses US claims that โChina exports to compensate for weak domestic demandโ and โChina has weak demand because its households save too muchโ.
In comparison with the market in the United States, he concludes as follows :
โThe problem isnโt Chinese over-capacity; itโs American under-capacity. This is the result of more than four decades of Washington policy priority, which has seen expansion in financial and other services but a relative decline in manufacturing.
The problem isnโt excessive Chinese savings and Chinese under-consumption; itโs excessive American debt and insufficient domestic savings.
The problem isnโt Chinaโs low cost manufacturing causing global distortions; itโs American dollar hegemony, weaponisation of the monetary system and penchant for military interventions.โ
Read his complete article here.
And last weekโฆ
May Day holidays in China
The May Day holidays (May 1-5) witnessed an average of 270 million daily passenger trips across all modes of transportation. Self-driving trips and car rentals see sharp increases while China railways expect a total of 144 million passenger trips over the course of the holidays. All modes surpassing pre-pandemic levels in 2019.
Also international flight travels increased by 20% compared to 2019. Top 3 destinations Japan, Thailand, South Korea.
Hangzhou Railway Station, May 1 (credit Visuals_China)
Shanghai, May 1. On this day alone, Shanghai welcomed more than 3 million tourists (credit Visuals_China)
Infinite Music Festival in Tongzhou district, Beijing (credit Visuals_China)
For more insight and depth on China, browse China21 Journal essays and articles