Sexual education in China is a bit like freedom of speech: People have heard about it, but prefer to stay away from it. The fact that there is now a growing market for sex toys in a conservative society like China’s is an interesting development that Fabian Peltsch looks at for us today.
It is hardly surprising that it is mainly young people from urban centers who lose their shyness towards new trends. This also has to do with the Covid pandemic: During the lockdowns, one of the few booming industries in China was the explicit industry. One of the effects of this is a slow de-tabooing of personal desires below the belt. In contrast to freedom of expression, you can’t get burned by sex toys.
Our second analysis is geopolitical. The AIIB, the development bank founded by China, continues to refrain from supporting Russian infrastructure projects. This was revealed to us exclusively by its German Vice President Ludger Schuknecht.
For the AIIB, maintaining distance from Russia is an important element of its external image. Because China indirectly supports the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the AIIB’s position vis-à-vis Moscow is closely scrutinized, especially as it is also funded by other countries, including Germany. Since its foundation almost nine years ago, the AIIB has been accused of representing Chinese national interests. And Russia’s defense minister once again confirmed yesterday that Russia and China are very close.
China is also the sex toy workbench of the world: Around 70 percent of adult toys produced worldwide are manufactured in the People’s Republic. Chinese shopping platforms such as Temu now ship worldwide without intermediaries – at prices that Western manufacturers often cannot compete with.
However, China’s sex toy industry is no longer focusing solely on exports, but is increasingly trying to satisfy the growing domestic demand. This also has to do with the Covid pandemic: During the lockdowns, the sex toy industry was one of the few sectors in China to record growth. Although consumption rates are still far behind those in Japan, the largest market in East Asia, the Chinese market is promising. It could reach a volume of 12.3 billion US dollars by 2030. By comparison, the US market was estimated at USD 1.3 billion in 2022. The following trends emerged at the last China Adult Care Expo, the largest Chinese industry trade fair in Shanghai:
According to estimates, there are 900 million sexually active people in China, with 93 percent of sales of sex toys being made by young adults under the age of 35. “More and more young Chinese are embracing their sexual desires and casting off sexual shame,” Lu Wang from the Shanghai-based company Master4Fancy四趣 told Table.Briefings. Together with two friends, the 35-year-old founded the sex toy start-up in 2019. Their target group is women and people from the LGBTQ community, “whose fantasies have so far been given little consideration in the traditional sex toy market.”
Master4Fancy now has ten employees. The team specializes in toys designed to stimulate the imagination, sometimes resembling tentacles or sometimes orchids. Some are also directly inspired by Chinese mythology, says Lu, such as the dragon model “Gem The Keeper.” “For far too long, toys have been designed as mere ‘male substitutes,‘” says Lu. “Most of the designs on the market are pretty basic – flesh-colored parts in the shape of a penis. We want to change that.” An analysis of followers of their various channels shows that around 64 percent of potential buyers are women and 36 percent are men.
Sex toys in China used to be sold mainly in small shops, coyly labeled as “health products.” With the rise of e-commerce, these shops, which also sold sexual enhancers and underwear, have virtually disappeared. The advantage of e-commerce platforms is that they allow for more or less anonymous shopping, says Lu. They are essential for the survival of niche companies such as Master4Fancy. However, their start-up products are not easy to find on platforms such as Taobao and JD.com – they may be sold, but cannot be advertised. “Customers need a special link to find our shop, as we are not allowed to appear in the search results.” A kind of shadowban. It also frequently happens that her products are taken down for no reason while other products are not.
Aside from easier access, e-commerce has also helped to massively de-taboo the topic. “Many customers contact us on Taobao asking whether it’s okay to use a toy for their first sexual experience or what to do if their parents find out about the toy and confront them about it.” They have deliberately designed their toys as collectibles, not primarily intended to be pornographic, says Lu, who, like the three other founders, has previously worked in sex education. “Displaying sex toys in your own home is becoming less and less of a taboo. It’s also a small act of rebellion in a repressive environment.”
Society’s views on sexuality in China are still predominantly conservative. Sex education for young people only happens at school as a shameful part of biology lessons. For example, the term “puberty education” (青春期教育) is used more frequently than “sex education.” In a 2019 report published by UNESCO and & UNFPA, the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency, several teachers said that they omitted “sensitive parts” of sex education lessons because they were “extremely uncomfortable” with the topic. Parents also prefer to remain silent rather than actively engage in sexual education. Alongside pornography, online forums remain the primary source of information.
The issue of sex education is polarizing in China, says Lu. Some support it, others are strictly against it and fear a moral decline. “But overall, sex education is improving!” In the past, it mainly focussed on health risks, such as AIDS or unwanted pregnancies. Today, China’s online self-help forums are also about open dialogue about sexual pleasure. “Female masturbation, which used to be a taboo subject, is receiving much more attention, which is a big change,” says Lu. As a sex toy supplier, she also sees herself in the role of educator in this regard. Other start-ups, such as Beijing-based Sistalk, follow this self-definition. For example, at the above-mentioned Shanghai trade fair, they advertised a vibrator that can predict ovulation by measuring the internal temperature or create personalized, AI-optimized pulse patterns for the respective user.
Lu points out that the new openness has so far been particularly noticeable among the young population of larger cities. In rural regions, people still have problems with diverse sex education. “I have an 18-year-old friend from a rural area who didn’t dare to ask her boyfriend to use a condom because she was afraid he would think she was promiscuous. She ended up getting pregnant. Hearing stories like that makes me angry and sad,” says Lu. She believes that there is still a lot to be done to liberate people’s relationship with sexuality and to ensure that sex toys are widely accepted.
“For example, there are many men who only come to our sites to insult us or harass us. We rarely respond to them – we don’t want them to feel like they’re getting attention for their behavior.” The parents of some of the founders also have strong reservations about their daughters’ careers. One of them was even called a whore by her father, says Lu. She gave her 47-year-old mother a vibrator as a kind of olive branch. “Many married women over 40 lose their sex life when their husbands struggle with problems such as erectile dysfunction.” Lu’s mother wasn’t comfortable with the idea of using the vibrator. “She ended up driving 10 kilometers away from home to send it back to me so that no one she knew would find out that she had a sex toy.”
Two and a half years after the start of the war in Ukraine, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), which was founded in 2016 on a Chinese initiative, maintains its “no” to Russia. “Cooperation with the Russian side remains frozen. There is currently no reason to change anything,” German AIIB Vice President Ludger Schuknecht told Table.Briefings.
Russia is one of the founding members of the AIIB, which Beijing launched as an alternative to established development banks such as the World Bank and the Asia Development Bank (ADB). After China and India, Russia holds the third-largest voting share in the AIIB with around six percent, and it has a seat on the board of directors. China has by far the largest voting rights with 27 percent. The bank’s no to Russia means that the AIIB will not fund any projects with Russian partners for the time being.
Affected are three infrastructure projects that the AIIB would have funded with a total of 1.1 billion US dollars. Two of them, intended for Russian rail transport, have been suspended while funding for a third project to expand the Kola Highway between St. Petersburg and Murmansk has been terminated.
Keeping distance from Russia is an important element of the AIIB’s external image. Because China is indirectly supporting the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the AIIB’s position vis-à-vis Moscow is under scrutiny. However, at least regarding staff, Russia is still represented in the bank’s management. Like Schuknecht, Konstantin Limitowski is one of five vice presidents. Limitowski worked for the European Development Bank until 2018. Before that, he was responsible for international projects at the Russian VTB Group for several years.
Since it was founded almost nine years ago, critics have accused the bank of being an instrument of national Chinese interests – primarily for the purpose of supporting New Silk Road Initiative projects with the help of international partners. “One of our challenges is that we always explain that although the AIIB is based in Beijing, China is not the dominant player despite holding the largest shares,” says Schuknecht. In fact, China’s geopolitical rival India is by far the largest recipient of AIIB loans. Although India has so far shown little interest in supporting the New Silk Road, it has received 20 percent of the more than 48 billion US dollars that have flowed from the bank to date.
Around ten percent of the money went to China. “From a risk management perspective, we need projects in countries with a good credit rating, such as China, so that we can also realize projects with poor countries with a low rating,” says Schuknecht. The AIIB also works closely with the Chinese Export and Import Bank (Exim). It reports directly to the State Council and officially pursues the goal of promoting China’s foreign trade, investments and international economic cooperation.
Together with the Exim Bank, the AIIB funds projects inside and outside China. The aim is for Exim to improve its lending standards. The AIIB aims to set corresponding standards in its cooperation. In the past, the AIIB itself has been accused of not meeting its own lending standards. Schuknecht diagnoses “teething troubles.” While not perfect, “we have become quite good in the meantime,” he says, adding that they are trying to learn from their mistakes.
Although the AIIB now has a respectable 109 members, its significance compared to the major development banks has so far been limited. This is also because the USA has turned its back on it and Japan still rejects membership. The USA considers the AIIB a tool of Beijing and has tried to dissuade its allies from becoming members. Japan, on the other hand, sees direct competition for the Tokyo-based Asian Development Bank (ADB). “Japan’s position is regrettable because our bank’s operational business repeatedly leads to overlaps and intensive dialogue with the Japanese government,” says Schuknecht. Japan is “one of the pearls” that the AIIB is missing, precisely because, as a regional development bank, it would like to integrate such a large Asian economy.
Moreover, the AIIB is a comparatively small organization with just under 600 employees. The bank maintains no country branches and only relies on local partners. This limits the bank’s global relevance and means it is not as close to its customers, says Schuknecht. On the other hand, he also sees the lean administrative organization as an advantage. Employees could work directly on projects, which is done by the country branches at the World Bank.
Sinolytics is a European consulting and analysis company specializing in China. It advises European companies on their strategic orientation and specific business activities in the People’s Republic.
The southern section of the Shanghai Expo Culture Park, which opened at the end of September, has already become a crowd magnet. With a huge greenhouse and two artificial hills, the park aims to bring nature back to the shining business city. The twin hills (双子山 Shuāngzǐ Shān) in particular are a source of excitement and head-shaking. Their hollow structures house exhibition halls, parking lots and even a substation. Chinese travel review portals already ironically advertise a small waterfall on their slopes as “China’s Niagara Falls.”
Sexual education in China is a bit like freedom of speech: People have heard about it, but prefer to stay away from it. The fact that there is now a growing market for sex toys in a conservative society like China’s is an interesting development that Fabian Peltsch looks at for us today.
It is hardly surprising that it is mainly young people from urban centers who lose their shyness towards new trends. This also has to do with the Covid pandemic: During the lockdowns, one of the few booming industries in China was the explicit industry. One of the effects of this is a slow de-tabooing of personal desires below the belt. In contrast to freedom of expression, you can’t get burned by sex toys.
Our second analysis is geopolitical. The AIIB, the development bank founded by China, continues to refrain from supporting Russian infrastructure projects. This was revealed to us exclusively by its German Vice President Ludger Schuknecht.
For the AIIB, maintaining distance from Russia is an important element of its external image. Because China indirectly supports the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the AIIB’s position vis-à-vis Moscow is closely scrutinized, especially as it is also funded by other countries, including Germany. Since its foundation almost nine years ago, the AIIB has been accused of representing Chinese national interests. And Russia’s defense minister once again confirmed yesterday that Russia and China are very close.
China is also the sex toy workbench of the world: Around 70 percent of adult toys produced worldwide are manufactured in the People’s Republic. Chinese shopping platforms such as Temu now ship worldwide without intermediaries – at prices that Western manufacturers often cannot compete with.
However, China’s sex toy industry is no longer focusing solely on exports, but is increasingly trying to satisfy the growing domestic demand. This also has to do with the Covid pandemic: During the lockdowns, the sex toy industry was one of the few sectors in China to record growth. Although consumption rates are still far behind those in Japan, the largest market in East Asia, the Chinese market is promising. It could reach a volume of 12.3 billion US dollars by 2030. By comparison, the US market was estimated at USD 1.3 billion in 2022. The following trends emerged at the last China Adult Care Expo, the largest Chinese industry trade fair in Shanghai:
According to estimates, there are 900 million sexually active people in China, with 93 percent of sales of sex toys being made by young adults under the age of 35. “More and more young Chinese are embracing their sexual desires and casting off sexual shame,” Lu Wang from the Shanghai-based company Master4Fancy四趣 told Table.Briefings. Together with two friends, the 35-year-old founded the sex toy start-up in 2019. Their target group is women and people from the LGBTQ community, “whose fantasies have so far been given little consideration in the traditional sex toy market.”
Master4Fancy now has ten employees. The team specializes in toys designed to stimulate the imagination, sometimes resembling tentacles or sometimes orchids. Some are also directly inspired by Chinese mythology, says Lu, such as the dragon model “Gem The Keeper.” “For far too long, toys have been designed as mere ‘male substitutes,‘” says Lu. “Most of the designs on the market are pretty basic – flesh-colored parts in the shape of a penis. We want to change that.” An analysis of followers of their various channels shows that around 64 percent of potential buyers are women and 36 percent are men.
Sex toys in China used to be sold mainly in small shops, coyly labeled as “health products.” With the rise of e-commerce, these shops, which also sold sexual enhancers and underwear, have virtually disappeared. The advantage of e-commerce platforms is that they allow for more or less anonymous shopping, says Lu. They are essential for the survival of niche companies such as Master4Fancy. However, their start-up products are not easy to find on platforms such as Taobao and JD.com – they may be sold, but cannot be advertised. “Customers need a special link to find our shop, as we are not allowed to appear in the search results.” A kind of shadowban. It also frequently happens that her products are taken down for no reason while other products are not.
Aside from easier access, e-commerce has also helped to massively de-taboo the topic. “Many customers contact us on Taobao asking whether it’s okay to use a toy for their first sexual experience or what to do if their parents find out about the toy and confront them about it.” They have deliberately designed their toys as collectibles, not primarily intended to be pornographic, says Lu, who, like the three other founders, has previously worked in sex education. “Displaying sex toys in your own home is becoming less and less of a taboo. It’s also a small act of rebellion in a repressive environment.”
Society’s views on sexuality in China are still predominantly conservative. Sex education for young people only happens at school as a shameful part of biology lessons. For example, the term “puberty education” (青春期教育) is used more frequently than “sex education.” In a 2019 report published by UNESCO and & UNFPA, the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency, several teachers said that they omitted “sensitive parts” of sex education lessons because they were “extremely uncomfortable” with the topic. Parents also prefer to remain silent rather than actively engage in sexual education. Alongside pornography, online forums remain the primary source of information.
The issue of sex education is polarizing in China, says Lu. Some support it, others are strictly against it and fear a moral decline. “But overall, sex education is improving!” In the past, it mainly focussed on health risks, such as AIDS or unwanted pregnancies. Today, China’s online self-help forums are also about open dialogue about sexual pleasure. “Female masturbation, which used to be a taboo subject, is receiving much more attention, which is a big change,” says Lu. As a sex toy supplier, she also sees herself in the role of educator in this regard. Other start-ups, such as Beijing-based Sistalk, follow this self-definition. For example, at the above-mentioned Shanghai trade fair, they advertised a vibrator that can predict ovulation by measuring the internal temperature or create personalized, AI-optimized pulse patterns for the respective user.
Lu points out that the new openness has so far been particularly noticeable among the young population of larger cities. In rural regions, people still have problems with diverse sex education. “I have an 18-year-old friend from a rural area who didn’t dare to ask her boyfriend to use a condom because she was afraid he would think she was promiscuous. She ended up getting pregnant. Hearing stories like that makes me angry and sad,” says Lu. She believes that there is still a lot to be done to liberate people’s relationship with sexuality and to ensure that sex toys are widely accepted.
“For example, there are many men who only come to our sites to insult us or harass us. We rarely respond to them – we don’t want them to feel like they’re getting attention for their behavior.” The parents of some of the founders also have strong reservations about their daughters’ careers. One of them was even called a whore by her father, says Lu. She gave her 47-year-old mother a vibrator as a kind of olive branch. “Many married women over 40 lose their sex life when their husbands struggle with problems such as erectile dysfunction.” Lu’s mother wasn’t comfortable with the idea of using the vibrator. “She ended up driving 10 kilometers away from home to send it back to me so that no one she knew would find out that she had a sex toy.”
Two and a half years after the start of the war in Ukraine, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), which was founded in 2016 on a Chinese initiative, maintains its “no” to Russia. “Cooperation with the Russian side remains frozen. There is currently no reason to change anything,” German AIIB Vice President Ludger Schuknecht told Table.Briefings.
Russia is one of the founding members of the AIIB, which Beijing launched as an alternative to established development banks such as the World Bank and the Asia Development Bank (ADB). After China and India, Russia holds the third-largest voting share in the AIIB with around six percent, and it has a seat on the board of directors. China has by far the largest voting rights with 27 percent. The bank’s no to Russia means that the AIIB will not fund any projects with Russian partners for the time being.
Affected are three infrastructure projects that the AIIB would have funded with a total of 1.1 billion US dollars. Two of them, intended for Russian rail transport, have been suspended while funding for a third project to expand the Kola Highway between St. Petersburg and Murmansk has been terminated.
Keeping distance from Russia is an important element of the AIIB’s external image. Because China is indirectly supporting the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the AIIB’s position vis-à-vis Moscow is under scrutiny. However, at least regarding staff, Russia is still represented in the bank’s management. Like Schuknecht, Konstantin Limitowski is one of five vice presidents. Limitowski worked for the European Development Bank until 2018. Before that, he was responsible for international projects at the Russian VTB Group for several years.
Since it was founded almost nine years ago, critics have accused the bank of being an instrument of national Chinese interests – primarily for the purpose of supporting New Silk Road Initiative projects with the help of international partners. “One of our challenges is that we always explain that although the AIIB is based in Beijing, China is not the dominant player despite holding the largest shares,” says Schuknecht. In fact, China’s geopolitical rival India is by far the largest recipient of AIIB loans. Although India has so far shown little interest in supporting the New Silk Road, it has received 20 percent of the more than 48 billion US dollars that have flowed from the bank to date.
Around ten percent of the money went to China. “From a risk management perspective, we need projects in countries with a good credit rating, such as China, so that we can also realize projects with poor countries with a low rating,” says Schuknecht. The AIIB also works closely with the Chinese Export and Import Bank (Exim). It reports directly to the State Council and officially pursues the goal of promoting China’s foreign trade, investments and international economic cooperation.
Together with the Exim Bank, the AIIB funds projects inside and outside China. The aim is for Exim to improve its lending standards. The AIIB aims to set corresponding standards in its cooperation. In the past, the AIIB itself has been accused of not meeting its own lending standards. Schuknecht diagnoses “teething troubles.” While not perfect, “we have become quite good in the meantime,” he says, adding that they are trying to learn from their mistakes.
Although the AIIB now has a respectable 109 members, its significance compared to the major development banks has so far been limited. This is also because the USA has turned its back on it and Japan still rejects membership. The USA considers the AIIB a tool of Beijing and has tried to dissuade its allies from becoming members. Japan, on the other hand, sees direct competition for the Tokyo-based Asian Development Bank (ADB). “Japan’s position is regrettable because our bank’s operational business repeatedly leads to overlaps and intensive dialogue with the Japanese government,” says Schuknecht. Japan is “one of the pearls” that the AIIB is missing, precisely because, as a regional development bank, it would like to integrate such a large Asian economy.
Moreover, the AIIB is a comparatively small organization with just under 600 employees. The bank maintains no country branches and only relies on local partners. This limits the bank’s global relevance and means it is not as close to its customers, says Schuknecht. On the other hand, he also sees the lean administrative organization as an advantage. Employees could work directly on projects, which is done by the country branches at the World Bank.
Sinolytics is a European consulting and analysis company specializing in China. It advises European companies on their strategic orientation and specific business activities in the People’s Republic.
The southern section of the Shanghai Expo Culture Park, which opened at the end of September, has already become a crowd magnet. With a huge greenhouse and two artificial hills, the park aims to bring nature back to the shining business city. The twin hills (双子山 Shuāngzǐ Shān) in particular are a source of excitement and head-shaking. Their hollow structures house exhibition halls, parking lots and even a substation. Chinese travel review portals already ironically advertise a small waterfall on their slopes as “China’s Niagara Falls.”
