Air taxis – the high flyers at the Shanghai auto show
Study: China’s home advantage threatens Europe’s economic power
Auto Shanghai: ZF presents high-performance computer
Mahle: sales record in China
China to ramp up vaccine production
Central nank: curbing financial risks from climate change
Yu Yongding: securing growth through expansive economic policy
Profile: Gerd Kaminski
Dear reader,
Science fiction is becoming reality. This is shown by the current car show in Shanghai, where Frank Sieren took a closer look at the air taxi of a German provider. This vehicle of the future will only work with 5G technology, which makes it highly likely that it will be launched on the market in China first.
China is the elephant in the room when the EU considers what tools it needs to better counter external economic pressure. Amelie Richter has summarized the main points of a study by the Brussels-based think tank European Council on Foreign Relations, which warns that Europeans are at a disadvantage in the strategically important sectors of solar, telecommunications, and rail networks, and makes suggestions to the EU Commission on how to better defend itself against the economic attacks of companies raised in China’s protected domestic market.
You can follow what is currently being discussed at the Boao Forum in southern China in our news: State and party leader Xi Jinping promises the world to make Chinese vaccines a global public good and Beijing plans to ramp up production. China’s central bank president Yi Gang announced at the Boao Forum that his agency will analyze the financial risks of climate change more closely in the future – and the central bank also plans to invest more funds in green bonds. That could suit the EU.
Your Ning Wang
Feature
Air taxis – the high-flyers of the Shanghai auto show
The most innovative vehicle at Auto Shanghai is not a car in the traditional sense but an autonomous air taxi powered by battery-operated rotors. It will be presented at the stand of Geely, one of the largest car manufacturers in the world, which owns Volvo and is the largest single investor in Daimler. Theair taxi is a German hidden champion and comes from the company Volocopter from Bruchsal. Led by Geely, Volocopter raised €50 million in a 2019 funding round, giving Geely about a ten percent stake in the German company. Daimler joined Volocopter in a previous round. Geely and Volocopter are working on an “Urban Air Mobility Concept”. “Geely is transforming from an automaker into a mobility technology company,” said Geely founder Li Shufu, “Our joint venture with Volocopter underscores our confidence in air taxis as the next big challenge of battery-powered mobility concepts.”
And indeed, it seems to be getting underway in China now. Volocopter’s competitor, Ehang from Guangzhou in southern China, has just announced that the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has put together a team to certify autonomous air taxis. First up is the two-seater EH216. But the news is seen as a signal for the whole Autonomous Aerial Vehicle (AAV) industry, although the certification phase may well take two years if politicians don’t put pressure on it. This is also good news for another German start-up: Lilium. Serial investor Frank Thelen has a stake in it, but so does Tencent Group from Shenzhen in southern China. Lilium will be listed on the New York Nasdaq stock exchange in the second quarter of this year. The Munich-based company is merging with Qell Acquisition Corporation for this purpose. Lilium thereby expects revenues of $830 million to further develop its flying car.
At first glance, the flying taxis with their propellers look like drones. And like drones, the so-called VTOL aircraft (“Vertical Take-Off and Landing”) can take off and land vertically. So in practice, they function like small helicopters. However, they are quieter, easier to control, and much cheaper.
The future market of air taxisis one of the biginvestor bets of this decade. At investment bank Morgan Stanley, the market is expected to be worth $49 billion worldwide as early as 2023. Last year, more than $1 billion in venture capital flowed into the industry, significantly more than ever before. Manfred Hader, a partner at consulting firm Roland Berger, calculates the market potential at $90 billion annually by 2050: “We estimate that there will be about 160,000 commercial air taxis in the air by 2050.”
German champion
In addition to Geely and Daimler, companies such as Japan Airlines, Intel Capital, DB Schenker, and Micron Technology have also invested in the start-up Volocopter. This March, the start-up received a further €200 million from investors, including Continental AG, asset manager Blackrock, Avala Capital, Atlantia, NTT, and Tokyo Century. Volocopter has now raised a total of nearly $390 million. The company’s valuation is put at $624 million, according to data from PitchBook.
Volocopter plans to use the fresh money to set up the first commercial air taxi routes for its “VoloCity”. The “VoloCity” is a two-seater, all-electric model optimized for inner-city areas with a range of 35 kilometers and a top speed of 110 km/h.
The aircraft made its first manned vertical flight back in 2011, the first flight of a prototype in 2013, and the first autonomous flight in 2017. The associated ecosystem is called VoloIQ, and it is intended to offer a network of stops, so-called VoloPorts, at strategically important points, for example, in the city core and at airports. VoloIQ is intended to be the central link between the start-up and the authorities, transport operators, and other mobility providers within the urban infrastructure, says Volocopter CDO Alexander Oelling.“If the air taxis are easily accessible as a result, this will result in a higher frequency of flights than helicopters.” Volocopter applied for approval of the VoloCity taxi with the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in December, and type certification with the European EASA is running in parallel. Volocopter also has a logistics drone in development. “So far, we expect to get approval by the end of 2022,” says Volocopter CEO Florian Reuter. In Europe, they plan to offer their first flights at the 2024 Olympics in Paris. Further first routes are to be established in Singapore, China, and Japan.
Not without the Chinese market
The 5G mobile communications standard plays a central role in the smooth deployment of the air taxi technology, says Oelling. This is another reason why it is likely that the Volocopter will first become established in China rather than in Europe. The pressure to shift local transport to the air is also much greater in China than in Germany. In short, access to the Chinese market is at least as important for Volocopter as Geely’s money.
However, it is not necessarily dependent on foreigners. It is estimated that more than 200 start-ups worldwide are working on air taxi projects. China alone has around 150, including the aforementioned Ehang company from Guangzhou, which has developed two of the most sophisticated models to date: the Ehang 184 passenger drone and the Ehang 216 two-seater. Ehang has already completed over 10,000 test flights in all weather conditions. Hardly any other company has such a wealth of experience. And Ehang has strong partners: the company is controlled by the state-owned aircraft construction company Avic and, at the same time, cooperates with the Austrian Boeing and Airbus supplier FACC AG. According to data from the Lufthansa Innovation Hub, the enterprise has so far raised around $92 million. In terms of the number of active patents, Ehang is way ahead with 143. Volocopter currently comes in at 21.
Ehang has been listed since December 2019. The listing raised just $41 million. The company’s valuation settled at less than $700 million, but the hype surrounding air taxis has since sent the company’s value soaring into the billions. Earlier this year, the stock had risen nearly 300 percent in three weeks. After a critical report by short-seller Wolfpack Research, which claimed that some of Ehang’s sales were glossed over, the shares plunged more than 60 percent. Since then, the company has been trying to regain confidence, so far without much success with shareholders.
The market remains volatile. It is still unclear who will win the race. Roland Berger consultants believe that in the end, only 10 to 15 percent of today’s air taxi projects will make it commercially. The Volocopter certainly has good chances as a German-Chinese project. The fact that Geely is presenting the German air taxi at the Shanghai auto show makes it clear that they are serious about innovation.
autonomous driving
Car Industry
Electromobility
Geely
Shanghai Auto Show
Technology
Study: China’s home advantage threatens Europe’s economic power
A catchphrase when it comes to the China-EU Investment Agreement (CAI) is “level playing field”. The CAI is supposed to guarantee European companies (better) access to the market in China. However, in its trade policy with the People’s Republic, including the CAI, the EU Commission has so far ignored an important point, warns the think tank European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) in a study prepared jointly with the Rhodium Group: The extremely protected and huge Chinese domestic market has allowed firms there to grow, make profits and improve their product quality simply because of the size of the market – with little or no pressure from foreign competitors. In turn, the firms that grew up in China could tackle the market abroad. The study’s authors warn of “serious consequences” for several sectors that are crucial to the EU’s future.
What’s the problem?
Solar: China officially encourages foreign participation in its solar industry, but strong informal barriers have led to the absolute dominance of domestic solar module manufacturers, which now supply nearly 100 percent of the domestic market. Domestic producers have several advantages, according to the study: Since China is the largest global market for solar modules, Chinese companies achieved significant internal economies of scale there. Since photovoltaic factories in China are generally four times larger than in the US, Chinese solar companies can use their machinery more intensively, standardize products and optimize production processes. Combined with government subsidies, low input prices in China, and preferential access to credit, these advantages have enabled Chinese solar photovoltaic manufacturers to dramatically lower production costs and thus world market prices, the study says. So far, European regulators have failed to address the problem through existing mechanisms for anti-dumping and anti-subsidy cases. In the CAI, there is now at least the approach of making Chinese investments in the sector in Europe conditional on a reciprocal opening of the Chinese market.
Telecommunications: In this area, too, the size of the Chinese market alone makes an important difference, according to the study. Half of the world’s 4G base stations alone are installed in China, and the People’s Republic has also already built 700,000 5G base stations. Beijing, however, allows only limited participation by foreign players:The government has given informal instructions to China’s state-owned telecom operators to award no less than 70 percent of 4G orders to Huawei and ZTE, the study said. What this means for Chinese telecom giants is that profits from domestic sales allow them to offer more attractive packages abroad, such as lower prices. They can also invest heavily intechnological research and development. With a strong presence and track record at home, Huawei increases its credibility with foreign customers. In addition, there are government subsidies, tax breaks, and export credits, as well as political support for activities abroad. The authors of the study warn that European suppliers are now competing in an “uneven playing field” in a strategically important sector.
Rail transport: Foreign enterprises are officially allowed to participate in this sector. According to the study, however, the reality is more complex – China’s most important manufacturer of rail vehicles, the China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation (CRRC), has 86 percent of the total Chinese market volume of rail vehicles and almost 100 percent of the market for high-speed rail vehicles. The reason for this is the preference of the state-owned railroad company China Railway, which prefers to purchase its trains from domestic producers. In this industrial sector, too, the sheer size of the Chinese market leads to advantages for CRRC, which can scale massively – because CRRC is four times larger than its two main competitors. According to the study, its largest plant is six times larger than that of European rail giant Alstom. CRRC can therefore standardize its products and optimize its manufacturing processes. While the effects of the protected Chinese market in this sector are less drastic than those in telecommunications and solar, ECFR writes, the impact on European players could be significant in the long run, especially in third markets: In emerging markets, European rail companies face fierce competition and lose market share to CRRC.
What is recommended?
In order to counteract this development, the think tank of the EU Commission proposes various approaches:
More pressure for market opening and an EU procurement instrument: In addition to closely monitoring the market openings promised in the CAI, the Brussels authority must in the future also increase the pressure on China to open up other areas such as procurement markets. The planned international EU procurement instrument, on which Brussels is currently working, also occupies a key position in this regard.
Protecting and promoting European competitiveness: Brussels should encourage national tender authorities in EU member states to make greater use of EU public procurement directives in cases where Chinese companies bid for public contracts at low prices. The EU’s anti-dumping instruments could also be used more frequently. There were also expectations of the planned EU instrument on foreign subsidies.
Working with partners and supporting companies: The study suggests that EU policymakers consider helpingEuropean firms in sectors strategically important for Europe’s economic resilience that could be affected by China’s home advantage – at least temporarily. The think tank also recommends close cooperation with transatlantic and Indo-Pacific partners.
Strengthening the internal market and reducing barriers: The EU represents the second or third largest market in affected sectors, after China and the US, the study stresses. However, intra-European market barriers such as regulations, standards, fragmentation, and language differences make it difficult for European companies to do business in their domestic market. Removing these barriers is crucial to maintaining the competitiveness of European companies. Strengthening the European single market is not only a defensive measure, but also a proactive step towards improving European influence and strategic sovereignty, the authors conclude.
What is Brussels working on?
In the area of China’s market opening, the CAI is currently the most promising step – but because of sanctions from Beijing, the European Parliament’s work on the agreement is currently on hold. However, Brussels-based think tank Bruegel recently praised agreements on subsidies and state-owned firms enshrined in the CAI in an analysis. In a study published this week by the Polish Institute for International Relations (PISM), commissioned by Green Party European politician Reinhard Bütikofer, the authors warn, however, that Brussels has no legal means to demand the concessions China made in the CAI. With more economic power, the People’s Republic could also be less afraid of arbitrarily breaking agreements, according to the study.
Therefore, the EU wants to arm itself: A draft law for the planned EU instrument on foreign investment is to be presented in the coming weeks. The rules are intended to prevent European firms from being taken over by highly subsidized foreign companies and to prevent state-owned companies from abroad from snatching public contracts away from EU competitors. By the end of the year, the EU Commission also wants to present a new instrument against economic coercion, and the European Parliament has called for the process to be speeded up. The planned EU instrument for procurement (IPI) is currently still stuck in the EU Council. According to EU circles, it is unlikely that there will be any development here in the coming period.
In its realignment of international trade policy, the EU Commission has generally also advocated a more assertive approach. Most recently, the Brussels authorities also got serious and imposed anti-dumping duties and provisional anti-dumping duties on various aluminum products from China.
Chinese Communist Party
Domestic policy of the CP China
ECFR
Mobile communications
News
Auto Shanghai: ZF presents high-performance computer
German automotive supplier ZF presented the latest generation of its special computer for autonomous driving at Auto Shanghai, as well as what it claims is a globally innovative system for automated parking. Also present was Holger Klein, the board member responsible for Asia-Pacific – which shows that Auto Shanghai is an important leading trade fair even under pandemic conditions – and for the German supplier industry as well. This is, of course, due to the attractive Chinese market – in tech-savvy China, there is huge interest in all self-driving car solutions. Beijing is promoting the technology and wants mass production of carscapable oflevel 3 automated driving by 2025. Such cars can drive on their own under certain conditions but need a human at the wheel who can always intervene.
The new ZF ProAI supercomputer builds on its predecessors but has significantly more computing power with 70 percent less energy consumption and smaller size, according to ZF. The computer’s artificial intelligence (AI) is optimized for deep learning, which ensures greater safety, among other things. “Designed for the requirements of software-defined vehicles and their new electrical/electronic architectures, this AI-enabled high-performance computer can serve as a domain, zone, or central controller,” ZF said. The computer offers “GPU-driven 360° fusion of all available sensor data, including environmental measurement data from radars, LiDARs, cameras, and audio patterns” – quite useful in the Chinese traffic melee. Klein described the new computer as the “most flexible, scalable and powerful” automotive supercomputer in the world. The new ZF ProAI is scheduled to go into series production in 2024 and is suitable for all levels of autonomous driving from 2 to 5, according to ZF.
According to ZF, the automated parking system presented in Shanghai is unique because it relies only on the car’s sensors and is therefore independent of the respective parking garage infrastructure. The new technology, called “Visual Simultaneous Localization and Mapping” (vSLAM), enables real-time localization and mapping to the nearest centimeter with the help of cameras, radar, and ultrasound. “The entire system is being developed in China and will be used for the first time by a Chinese automaker in late 2022,” said Renee Wang, president of ZF China and senior vice president of operations for the Asia Pacific region. “We believe this infrastructure-independent automated parking system will be a cost-effective solution for many global automakers.” ck
autonomous driving
Car Industry
Technology
Mahle achieves record sales in China in 2020
The automotive supplier Mahle GmbH has reported an increase in sales of around four percent in its China business in 2020. According to the company, of the €1.3 billion in total sales in China, the Thermal Management division brought in the largest share at around €370 million. On the other hand, the Filtration and Engine Peripherals division recorded the strongest performance, with an increase of around ten percent to €335 million. The Electronics and Mechatronics division, newly established in 2020, generated sales of €170 million in its first year.
At the auto show in Shanghai, Mahle is presenting a new high-voltage PTC heater that, combined with a heat pump, should enable a range extension of 20 percent for EVs. The company also promises to present a further development in the field of battery air conditioning: With a new electric compressor, both an increased battery life and range can be made possible, and the charging time can be shortened. bw
Car Industry
Electromobility
Finance
China to ramp up vaccine production
Despite little international experience in the vaccine market, Beijing wants to become a global vaccine provider. To this end, the country’s pharmaceutical industry is to massively expand its current production capacities, reports the South China Morning Post.
“China is building 18 production lines, and each big production line is like building a new China National Biotec Group,” announced the head of the China Immunization Administration in Beijing, Feng Duojia, referring to one of the country’s largest vaccine manufacturers. Biotec, a subsidiary of state-owned China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm), and Sinovac have produced 250 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine so far. Of these, more than 100 million have been exported abroad as part of vaccine diplomacy, mainly to countries that do not have access to mRNA vaccines.
The target is to produce five billion COVID-19 vaccine doses by the end of next year, Feng said. Just yesterday, China’s President Xi Jinping stressed in his speech at the Boao Economic Forum that China would honor its commitment to make vaccines a global public good. Beijing also hopes its vaccine diplomacy will strengthen its ties with developing countries, China.Table reported.
Most recently, the head of the epidemic authority had to publicly admit that the Chinese vaccines are far less effective than those from Biotech or Moderna. Beijing is considering mixing different types of COVID vaccines to increase the effectiveness of its vaccine.
The Chinese manufacturers have not yet received the green light for their vaccines from the World Health Organization (WHO) or the European Medicines Agency (EMA). It is a “big challenge” to produce the targeted quantities and “ensure that the product quality meets international or even higher standards,” Feng also admits. niw
EMA
Pharma
Central bank: mitigating financial risks from climate change
China’s central bank wants to pay more attention to the negative impact of climate change on financial stabilityand invest alarger part of its foreign exchange reserves in green bonds in the future. This was said by the Chinese central bank president, Yi Gang, in a speech at the Boao Forum. China could accordingly invest in EU green bonds, which are to be launched in the autumn to the tune of €250 billion, and finance part of the EU’s COVID Fund.
The goal is to urge financial institutionstomove towards carbon neutrality as “early as possible”, Yi said. The central bank wants to provide incentives for banks to financially support projects that reduce carbon emissions. It will also include climate factors in bank stress tests.
The financial risks of China’s carbon-intensive industries and companies are also highlighted by green finance expert and former senior central bank official Ma Yun, as reported by Bloomberg. The shift to clean energy and cleaner productionmeans thatcompanies in carbon-intensive sectorswillface a drop in sales, which in turn will lead to a higher risk of loan defaults. For coal-fired power plant operators, the loan default rate could rise to 22 percent by 2030 from 3 percent currently, according to Ma’s calculations.
The Chinese central bank is in the process of improving the standards for green bonds, Yi stressed. So far, the proceeds from green bonds in China are still allowed to be used for fossil projects (China.Table reported). An exclusion of fossil investments was already announced in the summer of 2020. The central bank is also working at the international level toalignthe different green investment regulations of different countries and communities of countries, Yi said. The topic will also be discussed at the G20 summit in Rome in October. nib
Climate
Finance
green finance
PBOC
Sustainability
Opinion
China still needs expansionary economic policy
By Yu Yongding
The Chinese economy grew by 6.5% in the fourth quarter of 2020, providing a strong indication that it has recovered from the COVID-19 shock. The market consensus is that, due to base effects, GDP growth shot up to more than 18% year on year in the first quarter of 2021, and will fall steadily in the remaining three quarters of the year before finally stabilizing.
Addressing this year’s meeting of the National People’s Congress last month, Prime Minister Li Keqiang announced that China’s growth target for 2021 is “above 6%.” While the economy’s growth momentum looks strong at the moment, there are signs that China may risk tightening fiscal and monetary policy too soon.
According to the Ministry of Finance, general budget revenues will increase by 8.1% this year, while general budget expenditures will grow by just 1.8%. It is rare for government spending to grow so much more slowly than budget revenues. And although the government’s planned issuance in 2021 of CN¥7.2 trillion ($1.1 trillion) in bonds is still high, it is materially smaller than the CN¥8.5 trillion it issued last year. At the same time, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC, the central bank) is likely to maintain its monetary policy stance, if not tighten it.
Achieving eight percent growth
The Chinese government’s cautious attitude toward expansionary macroeconomic policy reflects its vigilance regarding inflation and financial risks – especially the latter. Though inflation may worsen somewhat in the near future, it is unlikely to be economically destabilizing. While China should pay great attention to the problem of high leverage ratios, its financial vulnerability has been exaggerated. It is difficult to imagine how a high-saving, high-growth economy, with huge state-owned assets at its disposal and limited foreign debt, can be brought down by a systemic financial crisis resulting from high leverage ratios (China.Table reported).
In my view, therefore, China’s macroeconomic policy in 2021 should focus on boosting growth in line with the economy’s potential growth rate, rather than on stabilizing or lowering leverage ratios. Assuming that China’s potential growth rate is 6%, back-of-the-envelope calculations show that, taking the base effect into consideration, the economy should expand by more than 8% this year.
China’s growth in 2020 was driven by fixed-asset investment and exports. This pattern is not ideal. But unless the steady increase in disposable incomes resulting from strong GDP growth has convinced Chinese consumers that sunny days are here to stay, households are not likely to spend more and deplete their savings. In fact, household spending growth, in terms of total retail sales of social consumer goods, weakened in the first two months of 2021. Moreover, exports probably will contribute less to China’s GDP growth in 2021 than they did last year, owing to the global economic recovery and base effects.
Fixed-asset investment, which comprises three main categories – real estate, manufacturing, and infrastructure – has grown strongly, but its sequential growth rate has started to fall. Real-estate investment accounted for the bulk of fixed-asset investment growth in 2020, but this is unlikely to be repeated in 2021. And it is highly uncertain whether manufacturing investment can become the mainstay of investment growth.
Increasing investment in infrastructure
So, to compensate for the aggregate demand shortfall, the government has no alternative but to use expansionary fiscal and monetary policy to support infrastructure investment. In 2020, infrastructure investment grew by just 0.9%, compared to more than 40% in 2009.
Whether a government’s budgetary plan is appropriate depends on the country’s indicative or mandatory growth target. To achieve annual growth of 8% in 2021, China needs a much larger increase in infrastructure investment than last year. Furthermore, such investment should be financed directly through government budgets rather than by bank loans to subnational authorities.
Lowering the interest rate as quantitative easing
In hindsight, the central government should have issued enough bonds to fund the CN¥4 trillion stimulus package in 2008-10 rather than leaving local governments to borrow from banks to finance infrastructure investment through local government financing vehicles. Doing so would have avoided the financial vulnerability created by local government debts and shadow-banking activities, and also given China’s government-bond market an ideal opportunity to develop. In 2021, the government may need to issue more bonds than planned, and the PBOC may need to lower the interest rate to facilitate this – if necessary, by going so far as to implement a variant of quantitative easing.
Needless to say, macroeconomic policy alone will not be enough. The authorities should implement many more structural reforms so that all economic actors, especially local governments, have the right incentives to respond actively and reasonably to stimulus measures. But to consolidate its post-pandemic growth momentum in 2021, China should not be in a hurry to exit from expansionary fiscal and monetary policy.
Yu Yongding, a former president of the China Society of World Economics and director of the Institute of WorldEconomics and Politics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, served on the Monetary Policy Committee of the People’s Bank of China from 2004 to 2006.
Head of the Austrian Institute for China and Southeast Asian Studies and the Austrian-Chinese Society
The fact that Austria and China are celebrating the 50th anniversary of their diplomatic relations this year is also thanks to Gerd Kaminski. “At the time, I demonstrated in terms of international law why it was okay to establish diplomatic relations with China,” says the Austrian legal scholar. His article on the recognition of the government in Beijing appeared in the Austrian Journal of Foreign Policy in 1971. “It was undoubtedly an important contribution,” he says. He still advises the Austrian Foreign Ministry on China issues today.
Gerd Kaminski discovered his enthusiasm for China very early. At the age of about 13, he read his first Chinese poems, at that time still as translations. Since then, he was hooked. While studying law, he learned the Chinese language and traveled there for the first time in 1972 for his habilitation. At that time, however, in the midst of the Cultural Revolution, the mood in Beijing was rather gloomy: “There were no more Chinese professors at the universities because everyone was weeding somewhere,” the 79-year-old says. Science was abolished, so to speak, in the conviction that Mao’s works would be enough to study.
A crash course with Gerd Kaminski
Anyone who talks to Gerd Kaminski about China quickly finds themselves in a crash course on Chinese history. In the meantime, he has been researching and working on the country for more than 60 years. His main focus is the Chinese conception of international law and China’s attitude towards human rights (China.Table reports). However, he is also passionate about Chinese culture and lifestyle. “I’m not the one who goes around with any big-heads, I’m all about contact with ordinary people in the villages”.
He has written or edited more than 80 books on China to date. He is also the director of the Austrian Institute for China and Southeast Asian Studies and the Sino-Austrian Society. With high-level delegation exchanges, which he had already organized in 1973, he was committed to good relations between the two countries. Austria and China are both very old cultures and this connects them, said Gerd Kaminski. The people in China are particularly fond of the New Year’s Concert. In addition, there is an Austrian cable car on almost every tall Chinese mountain. And under certain circumstances, Austria could soon profit from the Silk Road, provided that duty-free goods were distributed in Europe from Carinthia.
From time to time, however, Gerd Kaminski also experiences mistrust from China. For both the followers of Confucius and those of Mao articulate “a certain foreign skepticism”. Thus he would have to submit the manuscript for his lectures at the university in Peking and Wuhan beforehand. “And what especially hurts is that friends from China are becoming more cautious in their dealings“. To overcome that, however, China and Europe would have to break down prejudices and “stop lecturing each other”. Lisa Winter
Culture
Human Rights
New Silk Road
Dessert
Science fiction fantasies as advertising. 1,500 drones have conjured up a scannable QR code in the Shanghai night sky to mark the one-year anniversary of tech company Bilibili.
Air taxis – the high flyers at the Shanghai auto show
Study: China’s home advantage threatens Europe’s economic power
Auto Shanghai: ZF presents high-performance computer
Mahle: sales record in China
China to ramp up vaccine production
Central nank: curbing financial risks from climate change
Yu Yongding: securing growth through expansive economic policy
Profile: Gerd Kaminski
Dear reader,
Science fiction is becoming reality. This is shown by the current car show in Shanghai, where Frank Sieren took a closer look at the air taxi of a German provider. This vehicle of the future will only work with 5G technology, which makes it highly likely that it will be launched on the market in China first.
China is the elephant in the room when the EU considers what tools it needs to better counter external economic pressure. Amelie Richter has summarized the main points of a study by the Brussels-based think tank European Council on Foreign Relations, which warns that Europeans are at a disadvantage in the strategically important sectors of solar, telecommunications, and rail networks, and makes suggestions to the EU Commission on how to better defend itself against the economic attacks of companies raised in China’s protected domestic market.
You can follow what is currently being discussed at the Boao Forum in southern China in our news: State and party leader Xi Jinping promises the world to make Chinese vaccines a global public good and Beijing plans to ramp up production. China’s central bank president Yi Gang announced at the Boao Forum that his agency will analyze the financial risks of climate change more closely in the future – and the central bank also plans to invest more funds in green bonds. That could suit the EU.
Your Ning Wang
Feature
Air taxis – the high-flyers of the Shanghai auto show
The most innovative vehicle at Auto Shanghai is not a car in the traditional sense but an autonomous air taxi powered by battery-operated rotors. It will be presented at the stand of Geely, one of the largest car manufacturers in the world, which owns Volvo and is the largest single investor in Daimler. Theair taxi is a German hidden champion and comes from the company Volocopter from Bruchsal. Led by Geely, Volocopter raised €50 million in a 2019 funding round, giving Geely about a ten percent stake in the German company. Daimler joined Volocopter in a previous round. Geely and Volocopter are working on an “Urban Air Mobility Concept”. “Geely is transforming from an automaker into a mobility technology company,” said Geely founder Li Shufu, “Our joint venture with Volocopter underscores our confidence in air taxis as the next big challenge of battery-powered mobility concepts.”
And indeed, it seems to be getting underway in China now. Volocopter’s competitor, Ehang from Guangzhou in southern China, has just announced that the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has put together a team to certify autonomous air taxis. First up is the two-seater EH216. But the news is seen as a signal for the whole Autonomous Aerial Vehicle (AAV) industry, although the certification phase may well take two years if politicians don’t put pressure on it. This is also good news for another German start-up: Lilium. Serial investor Frank Thelen has a stake in it, but so does Tencent Group from Shenzhen in southern China. Lilium will be listed on the New York Nasdaq stock exchange in the second quarter of this year. The Munich-based company is merging with Qell Acquisition Corporation for this purpose. Lilium thereby expects revenues of $830 million to further develop its flying car.
At first glance, the flying taxis with their propellers look like drones. And like drones, the so-called VTOL aircraft (“Vertical Take-Off and Landing”) can take off and land vertically. So in practice, they function like small helicopters. However, they are quieter, easier to control, and much cheaper.
The future market of air taxisis one of the biginvestor bets of this decade. At investment bank Morgan Stanley, the market is expected to be worth $49 billion worldwide as early as 2023. Last year, more than $1 billion in venture capital flowed into the industry, significantly more than ever before. Manfred Hader, a partner at consulting firm Roland Berger, calculates the market potential at $90 billion annually by 2050: “We estimate that there will be about 160,000 commercial air taxis in the air by 2050.”
German champion
In addition to Geely and Daimler, companies such as Japan Airlines, Intel Capital, DB Schenker, and Micron Technology have also invested in the start-up Volocopter. This March, the start-up received a further €200 million from investors, including Continental AG, asset manager Blackrock, Avala Capital, Atlantia, NTT, and Tokyo Century. Volocopter has now raised a total of nearly $390 million. The company’s valuation is put at $624 million, according to data from PitchBook.
Volocopter plans to use the fresh money to set up the first commercial air taxi routes for its “VoloCity”. The “VoloCity” is a two-seater, all-electric model optimized for inner-city areas with a range of 35 kilometers and a top speed of 110 km/h.
The aircraft made its first manned vertical flight back in 2011, the first flight of a prototype in 2013, and the first autonomous flight in 2017. The associated ecosystem is called VoloIQ, and it is intended to offer a network of stops, so-called VoloPorts, at strategically important points, for example, in the city core and at airports. VoloIQ is intended to be the central link between the start-up and the authorities, transport operators, and other mobility providers within the urban infrastructure, says Volocopter CDO Alexander Oelling.“If the air taxis are easily accessible as a result, this will result in a higher frequency of flights than helicopters.” Volocopter applied for approval of the VoloCity taxi with the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in December, and type certification with the European EASA is running in parallel. Volocopter also has a logistics drone in development. “So far, we expect to get approval by the end of 2022,” says Volocopter CEO Florian Reuter. In Europe, they plan to offer their first flights at the 2024 Olympics in Paris. Further first routes are to be established in Singapore, China, and Japan.
Not without the Chinese market
The 5G mobile communications standard plays a central role in the smooth deployment of the air taxi technology, says Oelling. This is another reason why it is likely that the Volocopter will first become established in China rather than in Europe. The pressure to shift local transport to the air is also much greater in China than in Germany. In short, access to the Chinese market is at least as important for Volocopter as Geely’s money.
However, it is not necessarily dependent on foreigners. It is estimated that more than 200 start-ups worldwide are working on air taxi projects. China alone has around 150, including the aforementioned Ehang company from Guangzhou, which has developed two of the most sophisticated models to date: the Ehang 184 passenger drone and the Ehang 216 two-seater. Ehang has already completed over 10,000 test flights in all weather conditions. Hardly any other company has such a wealth of experience. And Ehang has strong partners: the company is controlled by the state-owned aircraft construction company Avic and, at the same time, cooperates with the Austrian Boeing and Airbus supplier FACC AG. According to data from the Lufthansa Innovation Hub, the enterprise has so far raised around $92 million. In terms of the number of active patents, Ehang is way ahead with 143. Volocopter currently comes in at 21.
Ehang has been listed since December 2019. The listing raised just $41 million. The company’s valuation settled at less than $700 million, but the hype surrounding air taxis has since sent the company’s value soaring into the billions. Earlier this year, the stock had risen nearly 300 percent in three weeks. After a critical report by short-seller Wolfpack Research, which claimed that some of Ehang’s sales were glossed over, the shares plunged more than 60 percent. Since then, the company has been trying to regain confidence, so far without much success with shareholders.
The market remains volatile. It is still unclear who will win the race. Roland Berger consultants believe that in the end, only 10 to 15 percent of today’s air taxi projects will make it commercially. The Volocopter certainly has good chances as a German-Chinese project. The fact that Geely is presenting the German air taxi at the Shanghai auto show makes it clear that they are serious about innovation.
autonomous driving
Car Industry
Electromobility
Geely
Shanghai Auto Show
Technology
Study: China’s home advantage threatens Europe’s economic power
A catchphrase when it comes to the China-EU Investment Agreement (CAI) is “level playing field”. The CAI is supposed to guarantee European companies (better) access to the market in China. However, in its trade policy with the People’s Republic, including the CAI, the EU Commission has so far ignored an important point, warns the think tank European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) in a study prepared jointly with the Rhodium Group: The extremely protected and huge Chinese domestic market has allowed firms there to grow, make profits and improve their product quality simply because of the size of the market – with little or no pressure from foreign competitors. In turn, the firms that grew up in China could tackle the market abroad. The study’s authors warn of “serious consequences” for several sectors that are crucial to the EU’s future.
What’s the problem?
Solar: China officially encourages foreign participation in its solar industry, but strong informal barriers have led to the absolute dominance of domestic solar module manufacturers, which now supply nearly 100 percent of the domestic market. Domestic producers have several advantages, according to the study: Since China is the largest global market for solar modules, Chinese companies achieved significant internal economies of scale there. Since photovoltaic factories in China are generally four times larger than in the US, Chinese solar companies can use their machinery more intensively, standardize products and optimize production processes. Combined with government subsidies, low input prices in China, and preferential access to credit, these advantages have enabled Chinese solar photovoltaic manufacturers to dramatically lower production costs and thus world market prices, the study says. So far, European regulators have failed to address the problem through existing mechanisms for anti-dumping and anti-subsidy cases. In the CAI, there is now at least the approach of making Chinese investments in the sector in Europe conditional on a reciprocal opening of the Chinese market.
Telecommunications: In this area, too, the size of the Chinese market alone makes an important difference, according to the study. Half of the world’s 4G base stations alone are installed in China, and the People’s Republic has also already built 700,000 5G base stations. Beijing, however, allows only limited participation by foreign players:The government has given informal instructions to China’s state-owned telecom operators to award no less than 70 percent of 4G orders to Huawei and ZTE, the study said. What this means for Chinese telecom giants is that profits from domestic sales allow them to offer more attractive packages abroad, such as lower prices. They can also invest heavily intechnological research and development. With a strong presence and track record at home, Huawei increases its credibility with foreign customers. In addition, there are government subsidies, tax breaks, and export credits, as well as political support for activities abroad. The authors of the study warn that European suppliers are now competing in an “uneven playing field” in a strategically important sector.
Rail transport: Foreign enterprises are officially allowed to participate in this sector. According to the study, however, the reality is more complex – China’s most important manufacturer of rail vehicles, the China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation (CRRC), has 86 percent of the total Chinese market volume of rail vehicles and almost 100 percent of the market for high-speed rail vehicles. The reason for this is the preference of the state-owned railroad company China Railway, which prefers to purchase its trains from domestic producers. In this industrial sector, too, the sheer size of the Chinese market leads to advantages for CRRC, which can scale massively – because CRRC is four times larger than its two main competitors. According to the study, its largest plant is six times larger than that of European rail giant Alstom. CRRC can therefore standardize its products and optimize its manufacturing processes. While the effects of the protected Chinese market in this sector are less drastic than those in telecommunications and solar, ECFR writes, the impact on European players could be significant in the long run, especially in third markets: In emerging markets, European rail companies face fierce competition and lose market share to CRRC.
What is recommended?
In order to counteract this development, the think tank of the EU Commission proposes various approaches:
More pressure for market opening and an EU procurement instrument: In addition to closely monitoring the market openings promised in the CAI, the Brussels authority must in the future also increase the pressure on China to open up other areas such as procurement markets. The planned international EU procurement instrument, on which Brussels is currently working, also occupies a key position in this regard.
Protecting and promoting European competitiveness: Brussels should encourage national tender authorities in EU member states to make greater use of EU public procurement directives in cases where Chinese companies bid for public contracts at low prices. The EU’s anti-dumping instruments could also be used more frequently. There were also expectations of the planned EU instrument on foreign subsidies.
Working with partners and supporting companies: The study suggests that EU policymakers consider helpingEuropean firms in sectors strategically important for Europe’s economic resilience that could be affected by China’s home advantage – at least temporarily. The think tank also recommends close cooperation with transatlantic and Indo-Pacific partners.
Strengthening the internal market and reducing barriers: The EU represents the second or third largest market in affected sectors, after China and the US, the study stresses. However, intra-European market barriers such as regulations, standards, fragmentation, and language differences make it difficult for European companies to do business in their domestic market. Removing these barriers is crucial to maintaining the competitiveness of European companies. Strengthening the European single market is not only a defensive measure, but also a proactive step towards improving European influence and strategic sovereignty, the authors conclude.
What is Brussels working on?
In the area of China’s market opening, the CAI is currently the most promising step – but because of sanctions from Beijing, the European Parliament’s work on the agreement is currently on hold. However, Brussels-based think tank Bruegel recently praised agreements on subsidies and state-owned firms enshrined in the CAI in an analysis. In a study published this week by the Polish Institute for International Relations (PISM), commissioned by Green Party European politician Reinhard Bütikofer, the authors warn, however, that Brussels has no legal means to demand the concessions China made in the CAI. With more economic power, the People’s Republic could also be less afraid of arbitrarily breaking agreements, according to the study.
Therefore, the EU wants to arm itself: A draft law for the planned EU instrument on foreign investment is to be presented in the coming weeks. The rules are intended to prevent European firms from being taken over by highly subsidized foreign companies and to prevent state-owned companies from abroad from snatching public contracts away from EU competitors. By the end of the year, the EU Commission also wants to present a new instrument against economic coercion, and the European Parliament has called for the process to be speeded up. The planned EU instrument for procurement (IPI) is currently still stuck in the EU Council. According to EU circles, it is unlikely that there will be any development here in the coming period.
In its realignment of international trade policy, the EU Commission has generally also advocated a more assertive approach. Most recently, the Brussels authorities also got serious and imposed anti-dumping duties and provisional anti-dumping duties on various aluminum products from China.
Chinese Communist Party
Domestic policy of the CP China
ECFR
Mobile communications
News
Auto Shanghai: ZF presents high-performance computer
German automotive supplier ZF presented the latest generation of its special computer for autonomous driving at Auto Shanghai, as well as what it claims is a globally innovative system for automated parking. Also present was Holger Klein, the board member responsible for Asia-Pacific – which shows that Auto Shanghai is an important leading trade fair even under pandemic conditions – and for the German supplier industry as well. This is, of course, due to the attractive Chinese market – in tech-savvy China, there is huge interest in all self-driving car solutions. Beijing is promoting the technology and wants mass production of carscapable oflevel 3 automated driving by 2025. Such cars can drive on their own under certain conditions but need a human at the wheel who can always intervene.
The new ZF ProAI supercomputer builds on its predecessors but has significantly more computing power with 70 percent less energy consumption and smaller size, according to ZF. The computer’s artificial intelligence (AI) is optimized for deep learning, which ensures greater safety, among other things. “Designed for the requirements of software-defined vehicles and their new electrical/electronic architectures, this AI-enabled high-performance computer can serve as a domain, zone, or central controller,” ZF said. The computer offers “GPU-driven 360° fusion of all available sensor data, including environmental measurement data from radars, LiDARs, cameras, and audio patterns” – quite useful in the Chinese traffic melee. Klein described the new computer as the “most flexible, scalable and powerful” automotive supercomputer in the world. The new ZF ProAI is scheduled to go into series production in 2024 and is suitable for all levels of autonomous driving from 2 to 5, according to ZF.
According to ZF, the automated parking system presented in Shanghai is unique because it relies only on the car’s sensors and is therefore independent of the respective parking garage infrastructure. The new technology, called “Visual Simultaneous Localization and Mapping” (vSLAM), enables real-time localization and mapping to the nearest centimeter with the help of cameras, radar, and ultrasound. “The entire system is being developed in China and will be used for the first time by a Chinese automaker in late 2022,” said Renee Wang, president of ZF China and senior vice president of operations for the Asia Pacific region. “We believe this infrastructure-independent automated parking system will be a cost-effective solution for many global automakers.” ck
autonomous driving
Car Industry
Technology
Mahle achieves record sales in China in 2020
The automotive supplier Mahle GmbH has reported an increase in sales of around four percent in its China business in 2020. According to the company, of the €1.3 billion in total sales in China, the Thermal Management division brought in the largest share at around €370 million. On the other hand, the Filtration and Engine Peripherals division recorded the strongest performance, with an increase of around ten percent to €335 million. The Electronics and Mechatronics division, newly established in 2020, generated sales of €170 million in its first year.
At the auto show in Shanghai, Mahle is presenting a new high-voltage PTC heater that, combined with a heat pump, should enable a range extension of 20 percent for EVs. The company also promises to present a further development in the field of battery air conditioning: With a new electric compressor, both an increased battery life and range can be made possible, and the charging time can be shortened. bw
Car Industry
Electromobility
Finance
China to ramp up vaccine production
Despite little international experience in the vaccine market, Beijing wants to become a global vaccine provider. To this end, the country’s pharmaceutical industry is to massively expand its current production capacities, reports the South China Morning Post.
“China is building 18 production lines, and each big production line is like building a new China National Biotec Group,” announced the head of the China Immunization Administration in Beijing, Feng Duojia, referring to one of the country’s largest vaccine manufacturers. Biotec, a subsidiary of state-owned China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm), and Sinovac have produced 250 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine so far. Of these, more than 100 million have been exported abroad as part of vaccine diplomacy, mainly to countries that do not have access to mRNA vaccines.
The target is to produce five billion COVID-19 vaccine doses by the end of next year, Feng said. Just yesterday, China’s President Xi Jinping stressed in his speech at the Boao Economic Forum that China would honor its commitment to make vaccines a global public good. Beijing also hopes its vaccine diplomacy will strengthen its ties with developing countries, China.Table reported.
Most recently, the head of the epidemic authority had to publicly admit that the Chinese vaccines are far less effective than those from Biotech or Moderna. Beijing is considering mixing different types of COVID vaccines to increase the effectiveness of its vaccine.
The Chinese manufacturers have not yet received the green light for their vaccines from the World Health Organization (WHO) or the European Medicines Agency (EMA). It is a “big challenge” to produce the targeted quantities and “ensure that the product quality meets international or even higher standards,” Feng also admits. niw
EMA
Pharma
Central bank: mitigating financial risks from climate change
China’s central bank wants to pay more attention to the negative impact of climate change on financial stabilityand invest alarger part of its foreign exchange reserves in green bonds in the future. This was said by the Chinese central bank president, Yi Gang, in a speech at the Boao Forum. China could accordingly invest in EU green bonds, which are to be launched in the autumn to the tune of €250 billion, and finance part of the EU’s COVID Fund.
The goal is to urge financial institutionstomove towards carbon neutrality as “early as possible”, Yi said. The central bank wants to provide incentives for banks to financially support projects that reduce carbon emissions. It will also include climate factors in bank stress tests.
The financial risks of China’s carbon-intensive industries and companies are also highlighted by green finance expert and former senior central bank official Ma Yun, as reported by Bloomberg. The shift to clean energy and cleaner productionmeans thatcompanies in carbon-intensive sectorswillface a drop in sales, which in turn will lead to a higher risk of loan defaults. For coal-fired power plant operators, the loan default rate could rise to 22 percent by 2030 from 3 percent currently, according to Ma’s calculations.
The Chinese central bank is in the process of improving the standards for green bonds, Yi stressed. So far, the proceeds from green bonds in China are still allowed to be used for fossil projects (China.Table reported). An exclusion of fossil investments was already announced in the summer of 2020. The central bank is also working at the international level toalignthe different green investment regulations of different countries and communities of countries, Yi said. The topic will also be discussed at the G20 summit in Rome in October. nib
Climate
Finance
green finance
PBOC
Sustainability
Opinion
China still needs expansionary economic policy
By Yu Yongding
The Chinese economy grew by 6.5% in the fourth quarter of 2020, providing a strong indication that it has recovered from the COVID-19 shock. The market consensus is that, due to base effects, GDP growth shot up to more than 18% year on year in the first quarter of 2021, and will fall steadily in the remaining three quarters of the year before finally stabilizing.
Addressing this year’s meeting of the National People’s Congress last month, Prime Minister Li Keqiang announced that China’s growth target for 2021 is “above 6%.” While the economy’s growth momentum looks strong at the moment, there are signs that China may risk tightening fiscal and monetary policy too soon.
According to the Ministry of Finance, general budget revenues will increase by 8.1% this year, while general budget expenditures will grow by just 1.8%. It is rare for government spending to grow so much more slowly than budget revenues. And although the government’s planned issuance in 2021 of CN¥7.2 trillion ($1.1 trillion) in bonds is still high, it is materially smaller than the CN¥8.5 trillion it issued last year. At the same time, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC, the central bank) is likely to maintain its monetary policy stance, if not tighten it.
Achieving eight percent growth
The Chinese government’s cautious attitude toward expansionary macroeconomic policy reflects its vigilance regarding inflation and financial risks – especially the latter. Though inflation may worsen somewhat in the near future, it is unlikely to be economically destabilizing. While China should pay great attention to the problem of high leverage ratios, its financial vulnerability has been exaggerated. It is difficult to imagine how a high-saving, high-growth economy, with huge state-owned assets at its disposal and limited foreign debt, can be brought down by a systemic financial crisis resulting from high leverage ratios (China.Table reported).
In my view, therefore, China’s macroeconomic policy in 2021 should focus on boosting growth in line with the economy’s potential growth rate, rather than on stabilizing or lowering leverage ratios. Assuming that China’s potential growth rate is 6%, back-of-the-envelope calculations show that, taking the base effect into consideration, the economy should expand by more than 8% this year.
China’s growth in 2020 was driven by fixed-asset investment and exports. This pattern is not ideal. But unless the steady increase in disposable incomes resulting from strong GDP growth has convinced Chinese consumers that sunny days are here to stay, households are not likely to spend more and deplete their savings. In fact, household spending growth, in terms of total retail sales of social consumer goods, weakened in the first two months of 2021. Moreover, exports probably will contribute less to China’s GDP growth in 2021 than they did last year, owing to the global economic recovery and base effects.
Fixed-asset investment, which comprises three main categories – real estate, manufacturing, and infrastructure – has grown strongly, but its sequential growth rate has started to fall. Real-estate investment accounted for the bulk of fixed-asset investment growth in 2020, but this is unlikely to be repeated in 2021. And it is highly uncertain whether manufacturing investment can become the mainstay of investment growth.
Increasing investment in infrastructure
So, to compensate for the aggregate demand shortfall, the government has no alternative but to use expansionary fiscal and monetary policy to support infrastructure investment. In 2020, infrastructure investment grew by just 0.9%, compared to more than 40% in 2009.
Whether a government’s budgetary plan is appropriate depends on the country’s indicative or mandatory growth target. To achieve annual growth of 8% in 2021, China needs a much larger increase in infrastructure investment than last year. Furthermore, such investment should be financed directly through government budgets rather than by bank loans to subnational authorities.
Lowering the interest rate as quantitative easing
In hindsight, the central government should have issued enough bonds to fund the CN¥4 trillion stimulus package in 2008-10 rather than leaving local governments to borrow from banks to finance infrastructure investment through local government financing vehicles. Doing so would have avoided the financial vulnerability created by local government debts and shadow-banking activities, and also given China’s government-bond market an ideal opportunity to develop. In 2021, the government may need to issue more bonds than planned, and the PBOC may need to lower the interest rate to facilitate this – if necessary, by going so far as to implement a variant of quantitative easing.
Needless to say, macroeconomic policy alone will not be enough. The authorities should implement many more structural reforms so that all economic actors, especially local governments, have the right incentives to respond actively and reasonably to stimulus measures. But to consolidate its post-pandemic growth momentum in 2021, China should not be in a hurry to exit from expansionary fiscal and monetary policy.
Yu Yongding, a former president of the China Society of World Economics and director of the Institute of WorldEconomics and Politics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, served on the Monetary Policy Committee of the People’s Bank of China from 2004 to 2006.
Head of the Austrian Institute for China and Southeast Asian Studies and the Austrian-Chinese Society
The fact that Austria and China are celebrating the 50th anniversary of their diplomatic relations this year is also thanks to Gerd Kaminski. “At the time, I demonstrated in terms of international law why it was okay to establish diplomatic relations with China,” says the Austrian legal scholar. His article on the recognition of the government in Beijing appeared in the Austrian Journal of Foreign Policy in 1971. “It was undoubtedly an important contribution,” he says. He still advises the Austrian Foreign Ministry on China issues today.
Gerd Kaminski discovered his enthusiasm for China very early. At the age of about 13, he read his first Chinese poems, at that time still as translations. Since then, he was hooked. While studying law, he learned the Chinese language and traveled there for the first time in 1972 for his habilitation. At that time, however, in the midst of the Cultural Revolution, the mood in Beijing was rather gloomy: “There were no more Chinese professors at the universities because everyone was weeding somewhere,” the 79-year-old says. Science was abolished, so to speak, in the conviction that Mao’s works would be enough to study.
A crash course with Gerd Kaminski
Anyone who talks to Gerd Kaminski about China quickly finds themselves in a crash course on Chinese history. In the meantime, he has been researching and working on the country for more than 60 years. His main focus is the Chinese conception of international law and China’s attitude towards human rights (China.Table reports). However, he is also passionate about Chinese culture and lifestyle. “I’m not the one who goes around with any big-heads, I’m all about contact with ordinary people in the villages”.
He has written or edited more than 80 books on China to date. He is also the director of the Austrian Institute for China and Southeast Asian Studies and the Sino-Austrian Society. With high-level delegation exchanges, which he had already organized in 1973, he was committed to good relations between the two countries. Austria and China are both very old cultures and this connects them, said Gerd Kaminski. The people in China are particularly fond of the New Year’s Concert. In addition, there is an Austrian cable car on almost every tall Chinese mountain. And under certain circumstances, Austria could soon profit from the Silk Road, provided that duty-free goods were distributed in Europe from Carinthia.
From time to time, however, Gerd Kaminski also experiences mistrust from China. For both the followers of Confucius and those of Mao articulate “a certain foreign skepticism”. Thus he would have to submit the manuscript for his lectures at the university in Peking and Wuhan beforehand. “And what especially hurts is that friends from China are becoming more cautious in their dealings“. To overcome that, however, China and Europe would have to break down prejudices and “stop lecturing each other”. Lisa Winter
Culture
Human Rights
New Silk Road
Dessert
Science fiction fantasies as advertising. 1,500 drones have conjured up a scannable QR code in the Shanghai night sky to mark the one-year anniversary of tech company Bilibili.
