Germans’ image of China as a scientific nation is distorted: “We still believe that we have the technology and that the Chinese will learn from it.” In fact, China has overtaken all other countries, especially the United States, in many fields. This is what Niels Peter Thomas, head of China at Springer Nature, had to say in an interview conducted by Frank Sieren on the subject of university cooperation.
By contrast, Germany’s Education Minister Stark-Watzinger has once again urged caution and sees risks in many forms of cooperation, Tim Gabel reports. But like Thomas, many science practitioners believe it would be wrong to abandon German-Chinese collaborations. After all, China has become one of the most important research hubs.
Research cooperation also plays a role in our third analysis today – albeit as a side issue. German Economy Minister Robert Habeck wants to bring acquisitions by Chinese investors in Germany more closely under the control of the state. He plans to bundle existing investment screening regulations into a new law and tighten them further. The plan is also to apply it to access to intellectual property – and cooperation between universities.
Has research cooperation with mighty China become too risky?
No, that’s not it. The fact that we have to talk about it at all is mainly due to the fact that Chinese development in university research has become a great success story in recent years. China is currently replacing the United States as the No. 1 science nation.
This makes them competitors, some even speak of rivals. Why should we feed our competitors with know-how?
There are many legitimate points of criticism of certain problematic cooperations. The dual-use problem, for example. German researchers should not get involved in topics that can very easily be exploited for military purposes, for example. But this is not a fundamentally Chinese problem, but a general requirement. However, we should not define this area too narrowly. Because, conversely, there are many fields from which we can benefit greatly from Chinese involvement here. Many examples in the recent history of science show that openness and diversity are very beneficial for increasing knowledge: for everyone! Moreover, both the quantity and quality of output from Chinese research has increased significantly. China is already the strongest scientific nation or is strongly on its way to becoming it.
By what standard?
As early as 2020, the Japanese Ministry of Science and Technology published a report stating that China has overtaken the USA as the largest producer of scientific output. And this result has recently been confirmed by the Nature Index. This index regularly examines a certain portfolio of representative journals and can then provide insight into which countries and regions publish more research than others. This summer, for the first time ever, China was the leading scientific nation in the natural sciences and no longer the USA. Not everywhere, of course, but in the meantime, we observe a clear trend, in a great many fields, for instance, in chemistry and material sciences, but also many other fields such as computer science and engineering.
However, the quantity of research does not equal quality.
The Nature Index already takes quality into account in its calculations. Quality of research is of course very difficult to measure objectively. A widely used method is to count the citations per publication, assuming that an important result will also encourage other researchers to build on the results and cite it. Here, too, we have seen a clear trend towards higher quality in recent years, with some very good results from Chinese research. Many Chinese universities are now at the forefront when it comes to international recognition of their researchers’ findings. For example, Peking University in chemistry, Tsinghua or Tongji University in architecture, or China Agriculture University in agricultural science, to name just a few. The report by the Japanese Ministry of Science states that of the ten percent most cited articles in the world, more than a quarter already come from China, significantly more than from the USA in second place. German media often emphasize that only the quantity is increasing, while the quality is still lagging behind, but this is certainly not the case in a great many fields.
So have the Chinese already surpassed us in Germany?
No, not at all! Of course, due to its larger population, China also has a greater potential number of scientists, and that should not be forgotten when making comparisons. On average, German publications are cited even more often than publications by Chinese scientists. But interestingly, publications by mixed Sino-German author teams are cited even more often on average, both more than German ones alone, and thus more than Chinese ones alone. This is often overlooked.
So would it be better for us to continue research cooperation with China?
Yes, but it is also better for China. The performance of German academia would decline if we were to forego Sino-German research collaborations completely or to a large extent. The same would be true for Chinese science if there were fewer such collaborations. Global scientific progress would decline in any case if we and others were to abandon cooperation across the board. But in the long run, Germany loses relatively more, due to the quantitative ratios and the dynamics of Chinese scientific progress.
But you, as a representative of one of the world’s leading scientific publishing houses and with Nature as one of the most renowned scientific journals, are a victim of this development. The Chinese are also cutting you off as well.
The Chinese aim to establish science magazines that are also attractive for international submissions, and there is nothing wrong with this goal in principle. We do not shy away from competition, nor do we believe that isolation is the right way.
How far along is China on this path?
There are already several excellent Chinese journals in terms of impact factor, which means that they are frequently cited. That is anything but a matter of course, very, very respectable and happened much faster than expected. However, most of these journals still only publish a very small number of articles. Now they face the challenge of publishing more articles without lowering the impact factor. We know how difficult that is. But overall, these journals are an asset to global knowledge. It will not work without the Chinese, we would miss out on more than a third of the knowledge in many fields if we completely decoupled. This is especially true for these areas in the natural sciences.
The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research is more skeptical. It believes health and climate research are welcome, but all other areas must be critically scrutinized for technology leakage and military use.
In my view, the choice of topics is far too narrow. If we look at where humanity’s pressing problems are, it’s not just these two, but at least all 17 of the UN’s sustainable development goals. Climate and health are some of the most important issues, but fighting poverty and hunger, education, infrastructure innovation and economic growth are also important, and Chinese researchers are also working on these.
But let me reiterate: Are the risks of technology leakage not too great? We can no longer be naive in these times.
Perhaps our naivety lies elsewhere: We still believe that we have the technology and that the Chinese will learn from it. In many areas, however, this has long since changed. The right way, with critical exceptions that should be narrowly but clearly defined, is to open up everything to everyone as much as possible, in other words, to embrace open science. This is the fastest way for scientific progress to develop. Surprisingly, the Chinese are currently more open on this issue than the Germans, although formulated in the German mindset, they now also have much to lose. But they know: Together, we can make faster and better progress.
Niels Peter Thomas, 51, is President of Springer Nature Greater China and Managing Director of the book division of Springer Nature, one of the world’s leading science publishing houses based in Germany. As a high-school student, Thomas lived in Beijing from 1985 onwards; his mother was a lecturer there. Fascinated by the country, he returned as a university student. Thomas holds a degree in electrical engineering and earned his Ph.D. in economics.
In an editorial for the German daily FAZ, German Research Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger urged scientific institutions and universities at the beginning of the week to “review previous practices and question existing ways of thinking” when working with China. Germany must not be naïve when dealing with a regime that “proclaims the goal of transferring the results of civilian research into military applications and of achieving dominance in critical technologies,” Stark-Watzinger wrote.
The Minister warned that research cooperation with China requires an even more critical assessment of risks and benefits than is already true for international cooperation. Universities should also scrutinize existing collaborations. In saying this, Stark-Watzinger presumably alludes to the CSC scholarship holders and the Confucius Institutes at German universities. She already expressed criticism of both cooperations in previous weeks.
Stark-Watzinger also explicitly mentioned the case of cooperation at the University of Heidelberg, where Chinese quantum physicists had exploited the access to knowledge and infrastructure to “later return to China and work for its military.” The investigative network Correctiv had reported on this in June. The scientific community has a more differentiated perspective on the case. According to circles, such cooperation was common at the time.
Stark-Watzinger recommended that researchers planning or already involved in research collaborations utilize the advisory services of the Committees for Ethics in Security-Relevant Research (KEF) and promised to strengthen information services and support the development of independent China expertise. However, her article did not mention any specific measures or plans.
Hannes Gohli, head of the China Competence Centre of the University of Wuerzburg, criticizes the discrepancy between demands and political action. He agrees in principle that researchers should be made more aware of and informed about research cooperation, “but after demands, funds must also be provided for implementation,” Gohli told Table.Media. He said that the scientific community currently does not have sufficient funds to build up China expertise and to provide advice.
“If we truly want to make scientific cooperation with China safer, then demands and editorials are not sufficient, we simply need more support,” Gohli demanded. He observed that most researchers are not naïve, but ask many questions and handle the issue very carefully. The necessary infrastructures and information services are also available at universities and institutions in the scientific system, for example, at the German Rectors’ Conference or the German Academic Exchange Service, to deal with the issue. “However, they are often not sufficiently equipped at the working level.
Gholi also expressed doubts about whether the ethics committees would be able to provide more counseling. “These are great institutions that are unfortunately often not adequately staffed. KEFs often consist only of staff working part-time and in temporary positions that are put together like a jigsaw puzzle to create job opportunities for university staff.”
Germany’s Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, Robert Habeck, wants to legally limit China’s influence on the German economy. To this end, he plans to tighten and expand existing foreign investment screening in Germany. This is according to a paper from the ministry, available to Table.Media. The goal is to create a new investment screening law.
This new legislation is intended to cover all cases in which foreign companies make acquisitions or otherwise invest in Germany. This does not necessarily mean that acquisitions will be prohibited. But the buyers must seek Berlin’s approval for the transaction.
So far, this legal field has been covered by the Foreign Trade and Payments Act (AWG) and the Foreign Trade and Payments Ordinance (AWV), but now they are to be regulated in a separate law. This will supposedly facilitate the screening process. However, the idea paper primarily envisages a range of tightening up existing regulations. The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action is currently coordinating with the other ministries.
The key points for the law explicitly mention China, as the paper refers directly to the German government’s new China strategy. Under Habeck, the BMWK has been pursuing a China-critical course for some time. However, a so-called outbound investment screening, which would place German investments in the Far East under the ministry’s supervision, is not part of the current paper. German newspaper Handelsblatt had first reported on the planned legislation.
The planned legislative package is to contain nine core measures. These include bundling all previously separate regulations in the new “investment screening act,” the expansion of industrial sectors considered critical and the reversal of the burden of proof.
So far, the government had to prove that a sale – for example, of the Tollerort terminal at the Port of Hamburg to the Chinese state shipping company Cosco – is a security risk. In the future, companies must prove the opposite in “particularly security-relevant sectors.”
Otherwise, the ideas of the BMWK envisage some effective tightening as well:
However, bureaucratic simplifications are also planned, for instance, a set screening deadline or the conversion of criminal offenses into infractions. Collaboration: Carolyn Braun, Malte Kreutzfeldt
Canadian Isabel Crook, who passed away in Beijing on Sunday at the age of 107, was unique in many ways. She spent her entire life in China except for a few years studying in Toronto. She was a pioneer of foreign language teaching.
Isabel Crook was born on 15 December 1915 to a Canadian missionary family in Chengdu in southwest China’s Sichuan province. Her father, Homer Brown, was the dean of the West China Union University, and her mother, Muriel, had founded the first Montessori schools in China.
After spending most of her childhood in China, Isabel left to study anthropology in Toronto. After graduating at 23, she returned to China and devoted herself to field research on minorities in Sichuan.
In 1940, she met her husband, David Crook, in China. Under his influence, she joined the British Communists. David Crook, one of the leading Jewish-British communists, fought on the side of the Republic against the right-wing putschist Francisco Franco in the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). Wounded in battle, the Soviet KGB sent him to China to fight on the side of the Chinese in the Sino-Japanese War.
In the resistance against the Japanese fascists, he met Isabel, and they married in 1940. After a brief spell with the Royal Airforce in India, they were among the few Western foreigners who remained in China after Mao seized power and during the Cultural Revolution.
Isabel Crook published the first English books in China and went on to teach English at Beijing Foreign Studies University for over 70 years. She was instrumental in establishing, reforming and training teachers, especially in English.
She also trained the first group of translators at the Chinese Foreign Ministry. “They conveyed a positive image of China to the outside world, in the Cold War era when simplifications were the norm,” says British sinologist Dalia Davin, summarizing the Crooks’ work.
They stayed in China despite falling from grace during the Cultural Revolution. David was even imprisoned from 1967 to 1973, and Isabel was under house arrest on the university campus.
The Crooks openly sympathized with the student movement in Tiananmen Square in 1989. This is probably one of the reasons why Isabel Crook was only awarded the Friendship Medal in 2019, the highest Chinese medal for foreigners in China. At that point, her husband was dead for almost 20 years. The University of Toronto had already awarded her an honorary doctorate years earlier.
All her life, Crook’s mission was international understanding. Her son Michael, who cared for her in Beijing until her death, followed in her footsteps. In 1994, he was one of the founders of the Western Academy of Beijing (WAB), to this day one of the best international private schools in China.
In life, Isabel Crook was a positive, optimistic person who communicated with her three sons, Carl, Michael and Paul, via WeChat on her mobile phone almost to the end. Frank Sieren
Marigold harvest in Pingbei in the province of Hebei: The yellow petals of the marigold are said to have an anti-inflammatory effect, reducing pain and swelling. Mostly they are processed as tea. The price of a kilogram of the blossoms on the online trading platform Alibaba ranges between 0.50 cents and 1.50 euros.
Germans’ image of China as a scientific nation is distorted: “We still believe that we have the technology and that the Chinese will learn from it.” In fact, China has overtaken all other countries, especially the United States, in many fields. This is what Niels Peter Thomas, head of China at Springer Nature, had to say in an interview conducted by Frank Sieren on the subject of university cooperation.
By contrast, Germany’s Education Minister Stark-Watzinger has once again urged caution and sees risks in many forms of cooperation, Tim Gabel reports. But like Thomas, many science practitioners believe it would be wrong to abandon German-Chinese collaborations. After all, China has become one of the most important research hubs.
Research cooperation also plays a role in our third analysis today – albeit as a side issue. German Economy Minister Robert Habeck wants to bring acquisitions by Chinese investors in Germany more closely under the control of the state. He plans to bundle existing investment screening regulations into a new law and tighten them further. The plan is also to apply it to access to intellectual property – and cooperation between universities.
Has research cooperation with mighty China become too risky?
No, that’s not it. The fact that we have to talk about it at all is mainly due to the fact that Chinese development in university research has become a great success story in recent years. China is currently replacing the United States as the No. 1 science nation.
This makes them competitors, some even speak of rivals. Why should we feed our competitors with know-how?
There are many legitimate points of criticism of certain problematic cooperations. The dual-use problem, for example. German researchers should not get involved in topics that can very easily be exploited for military purposes, for example. But this is not a fundamentally Chinese problem, but a general requirement. However, we should not define this area too narrowly. Because, conversely, there are many fields from which we can benefit greatly from Chinese involvement here. Many examples in the recent history of science show that openness and diversity are very beneficial for increasing knowledge: for everyone! Moreover, both the quantity and quality of output from Chinese research has increased significantly. China is already the strongest scientific nation or is strongly on its way to becoming it.
By what standard?
As early as 2020, the Japanese Ministry of Science and Technology published a report stating that China has overtaken the USA as the largest producer of scientific output. And this result has recently been confirmed by the Nature Index. This index regularly examines a certain portfolio of representative journals and can then provide insight into which countries and regions publish more research than others. This summer, for the first time ever, China was the leading scientific nation in the natural sciences and no longer the USA. Not everywhere, of course, but in the meantime, we observe a clear trend, in a great many fields, for instance, in chemistry and material sciences, but also many other fields such as computer science and engineering.
However, the quantity of research does not equal quality.
The Nature Index already takes quality into account in its calculations. Quality of research is of course very difficult to measure objectively. A widely used method is to count the citations per publication, assuming that an important result will also encourage other researchers to build on the results and cite it. Here, too, we have seen a clear trend towards higher quality in recent years, with some very good results from Chinese research. Many Chinese universities are now at the forefront when it comes to international recognition of their researchers’ findings. For example, Peking University in chemistry, Tsinghua or Tongji University in architecture, or China Agriculture University in agricultural science, to name just a few. The report by the Japanese Ministry of Science states that of the ten percent most cited articles in the world, more than a quarter already come from China, significantly more than from the USA in second place. German media often emphasize that only the quantity is increasing, while the quality is still lagging behind, but this is certainly not the case in a great many fields.
So have the Chinese already surpassed us in Germany?
No, not at all! Of course, due to its larger population, China also has a greater potential number of scientists, and that should not be forgotten when making comparisons. On average, German publications are cited even more often than publications by Chinese scientists. But interestingly, publications by mixed Sino-German author teams are cited even more often on average, both more than German ones alone, and thus more than Chinese ones alone. This is often overlooked.
So would it be better for us to continue research cooperation with China?
Yes, but it is also better for China. The performance of German academia would decline if we were to forego Sino-German research collaborations completely or to a large extent. The same would be true for Chinese science if there were fewer such collaborations. Global scientific progress would decline in any case if we and others were to abandon cooperation across the board. But in the long run, Germany loses relatively more, due to the quantitative ratios and the dynamics of Chinese scientific progress.
But you, as a representative of one of the world’s leading scientific publishing houses and with Nature as one of the most renowned scientific journals, are a victim of this development. The Chinese are also cutting you off as well.
The Chinese aim to establish science magazines that are also attractive for international submissions, and there is nothing wrong with this goal in principle. We do not shy away from competition, nor do we believe that isolation is the right way.
How far along is China on this path?
There are already several excellent Chinese journals in terms of impact factor, which means that they are frequently cited. That is anything but a matter of course, very, very respectable and happened much faster than expected. However, most of these journals still only publish a very small number of articles. Now they face the challenge of publishing more articles without lowering the impact factor. We know how difficult that is. But overall, these journals are an asset to global knowledge. It will not work without the Chinese, we would miss out on more than a third of the knowledge in many fields if we completely decoupled. This is especially true for these areas in the natural sciences.
The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research is more skeptical. It believes health and climate research are welcome, but all other areas must be critically scrutinized for technology leakage and military use.
In my view, the choice of topics is far too narrow. If we look at where humanity’s pressing problems are, it’s not just these two, but at least all 17 of the UN’s sustainable development goals. Climate and health are some of the most important issues, but fighting poverty and hunger, education, infrastructure innovation and economic growth are also important, and Chinese researchers are also working on these.
But let me reiterate: Are the risks of technology leakage not too great? We can no longer be naive in these times.
Perhaps our naivety lies elsewhere: We still believe that we have the technology and that the Chinese will learn from it. In many areas, however, this has long since changed. The right way, with critical exceptions that should be narrowly but clearly defined, is to open up everything to everyone as much as possible, in other words, to embrace open science. This is the fastest way for scientific progress to develop. Surprisingly, the Chinese are currently more open on this issue than the Germans, although formulated in the German mindset, they now also have much to lose. But they know: Together, we can make faster and better progress.
Niels Peter Thomas, 51, is President of Springer Nature Greater China and Managing Director of the book division of Springer Nature, one of the world’s leading science publishing houses based in Germany. As a high-school student, Thomas lived in Beijing from 1985 onwards; his mother was a lecturer there. Fascinated by the country, he returned as a university student. Thomas holds a degree in electrical engineering and earned his Ph.D. in economics.
In an editorial for the German daily FAZ, German Research Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger urged scientific institutions and universities at the beginning of the week to “review previous practices and question existing ways of thinking” when working with China. Germany must not be naïve when dealing with a regime that “proclaims the goal of transferring the results of civilian research into military applications and of achieving dominance in critical technologies,” Stark-Watzinger wrote.
The Minister warned that research cooperation with China requires an even more critical assessment of risks and benefits than is already true for international cooperation. Universities should also scrutinize existing collaborations. In saying this, Stark-Watzinger presumably alludes to the CSC scholarship holders and the Confucius Institutes at German universities. She already expressed criticism of both cooperations in previous weeks.
Stark-Watzinger also explicitly mentioned the case of cooperation at the University of Heidelberg, where Chinese quantum physicists had exploited the access to knowledge and infrastructure to “later return to China and work for its military.” The investigative network Correctiv had reported on this in June. The scientific community has a more differentiated perspective on the case. According to circles, such cooperation was common at the time.
Stark-Watzinger recommended that researchers planning or already involved in research collaborations utilize the advisory services of the Committees for Ethics in Security-Relevant Research (KEF) and promised to strengthen information services and support the development of independent China expertise. However, her article did not mention any specific measures or plans.
Hannes Gohli, head of the China Competence Centre of the University of Wuerzburg, criticizes the discrepancy between demands and political action. He agrees in principle that researchers should be made more aware of and informed about research cooperation, “but after demands, funds must also be provided for implementation,” Gohli told Table.Media. He said that the scientific community currently does not have sufficient funds to build up China expertise and to provide advice.
“If we truly want to make scientific cooperation with China safer, then demands and editorials are not sufficient, we simply need more support,” Gohli demanded. He observed that most researchers are not naïve, but ask many questions and handle the issue very carefully. The necessary infrastructures and information services are also available at universities and institutions in the scientific system, for example, at the German Rectors’ Conference or the German Academic Exchange Service, to deal with the issue. “However, they are often not sufficiently equipped at the working level.
Gholi also expressed doubts about whether the ethics committees would be able to provide more counseling. “These are great institutions that are unfortunately often not adequately staffed. KEFs often consist only of staff working part-time and in temporary positions that are put together like a jigsaw puzzle to create job opportunities for university staff.”
Germany’s Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, Robert Habeck, wants to legally limit China’s influence on the German economy. To this end, he plans to tighten and expand existing foreign investment screening in Germany. This is according to a paper from the ministry, available to Table.Media. The goal is to create a new investment screening law.
This new legislation is intended to cover all cases in which foreign companies make acquisitions or otherwise invest in Germany. This does not necessarily mean that acquisitions will be prohibited. But the buyers must seek Berlin’s approval for the transaction.
So far, this legal field has been covered by the Foreign Trade and Payments Act (AWG) and the Foreign Trade and Payments Ordinance (AWV), but now they are to be regulated in a separate law. This will supposedly facilitate the screening process. However, the idea paper primarily envisages a range of tightening up existing regulations. The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action is currently coordinating with the other ministries.
The key points for the law explicitly mention China, as the paper refers directly to the German government’s new China strategy. Under Habeck, the BMWK has been pursuing a China-critical course for some time. However, a so-called outbound investment screening, which would place German investments in the Far East under the ministry’s supervision, is not part of the current paper. German newspaper Handelsblatt had first reported on the planned legislation.
The planned legislative package is to contain nine core measures. These include bundling all previously separate regulations in the new “investment screening act,” the expansion of industrial sectors considered critical and the reversal of the burden of proof.
So far, the government had to prove that a sale – for example, of the Tollerort terminal at the Port of Hamburg to the Chinese state shipping company Cosco – is a security risk. In the future, companies must prove the opposite in “particularly security-relevant sectors.”
Otherwise, the ideas of the BMWK envisage some effective tightening as well:
However, bureaucratic simplifications are also planned, for instance, a set screening deadline or the conversion of criminal offenses into infractions. Collaboration: Carolyn Braun, Malte Kreutzfeldt
Canadian Isabel Crook, who passed away in Beijing on Sunday at the age of 107, was unique in many ways. She spent her entire life in China except for a few years studying in Toronto. She was a pioneer of foreign language teaching.
Isabel Crook was born on 15 December 1915 to a Canadian missionary family in Chengdu in southwest China’s Sichuan province. Her father, Homer Brown, was the dean of the West China Union University, and her mother, Muriel, had founded the first Montessori schools in China.
After spending most of her childhood in China, Isabel left to study anthropology in Toronto. After graduating at 23, she returned to China and devoted herself to field research on minorities in Sichuan.
In 1940, she met her husband, David Crook, in China. Under his influence, she joined the British Communists. David Crook, one of the leading Jewish-British communists, fought on the side of the Republic against the right-wing putschist Francisco Franco in the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). Wounded in battle, the Soviet KGB sent him to China to fight on the side of the Chinese in the Sino-Japanese War.
In the resistance against the Japanese fascists, he met Isabel, and they married in 1940. After a brief spell with the Royal Airforce in India, they were among the few Western foreigners who remained in China after Mao seized power and during the Cultural Revolution.
Isabel Crook published the first English books in China and went on to teach English at Beijing Foreign Studies University for over 70 years. She was instrumental in establishing, reforming and training teachers, especially in English.
She also trained the first group of translators at the Chinese Foreign Ministry. “They conveyed a positive image of China to the outside world, in the Cold War era when simplifications were the norm,” says British sinologist Dalia Davin, summarizing the Crooks’ work.
They stayed in China despite falling from grace during the Cultural Revolution. David was even imprisoned from 1967 to 1973, and Isabel was under house arrest on the university campus.
The Crooks openly sympathized with the student movement in Tiananmen Square in 1989. This is probably one of the reasons why Isabel Crook was only awarded the Friendship Medal in 2019, the highest Chinese medal for foreigners in China. At that point, her husband was dead for almost 20 years. The University of Toronto had already awarded her an honorary doctorate years earlier.
All her life, Crook’s mission was international understanding. Her son Michael, who cared for her in Beijing until her death, followed in her footsteps. In 1994, he was one of the founders of the Western Academy of Beijing (WAB), to this day one of the best international private schools in China.
In life, Isabel Crook was a positive, optimistic person who communicated with her three sons, Carl, Michael and Paul, via WeChat on her mobile phone almost to the end. Frank Sieren
Marigold harvest in Pingbei in the province of Hebei: The yellow petals of the marigold are said to have an anti-inflammatory effect, reducing pain and swelling. Mostly they are processed as tea. The price of a kilogram of the blossoms on the online trading platform Alibaba ranges between 0.50 cents and 1.50 euros.
