The visit of US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo to China has started without complications. It is telling that this already must be chalked up as a success, given the strained relations between China and the US. Raimondo stressed in Beijing on Monday that maintaining stable economic relations is of utmost importance.
Joern Petring lists the measures that have already been decided on the first day of the visit. Find out why aircraft manufacturer Boeing, of all companies, hopes for further positive steps in our first analysis.
Meanwhile, German car manufacturers, in particular, are coming under increasing criticism. The accusation is that human rights violations occur in their Chinese supply chains. With the German Supply Chain Act, at the latest, this accusation is no longer only morally but also legally relevant.
Artificial intelligence could provide help. In our ongoing AI series, Christian Domke Seidel shows how companies can use language-based AI to monitor their supply chains better and discover legal violations more quickly. This approach is particularly interesting for companies doing business in China.
In a sign of slightly easing tensions, China and the US have agreed to deepen their trade talks at the start of US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo’s visit to Beijing. “It is profoundly important that we have a stable economic relationship which is to the benefit of both of our countries and, in fact, what the world expects of us,” Raimondo said at a meeting with Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao in Beijing on Monday.
Raimondo, who will stay in China until Wednesday, spoke of “complicated” and “challenging” relations. At the same time, however, she expressed hope that at least gradual improvements were possible: “I believe we can make progress if we are direct, open, and practical.” Beijing was willing to “foster a more favorable policy environment for stronger cooperation” and “bolster bilateral trade and investment,” Wang replied.
According to the US, the two sides agreed on the following measures:
However, it is not yet clear whether the visit of the US Secretary of Commerce can be considered a success. It would send a clear signal if she were at least to meet with Chinese Premier Li Qiang. Such a high-ranking reception would demonstrate that Washington’s appeal to stabilize relations is heard in Beijing.
An announcement in connection with the US aircraft manufacturer Boeing would also be a success for the US. Raimondos is scheduled to travel to Shanghai on Tuesday, where a visit to the Boeing branch is apparently also planned. On Friday, Bloomberg reported that after more than four years, medium-haul 737 Max jets could soon be delivered to China again.
While Boeing’s crisis aircraft has long been authorized to fly again in many parts of the world after some technical improvements, China waited a long time for approval. It may well be that Raimondo will announce the resumption of deliveries to China once she is in Shanghai.
Most recently, the following dynamic between Washington and Beijing could be observed: The USA is pushing, and China remains skeptical. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited China in May, Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen in July, as did US Climate Change Envoy John Kerry. Raimondo is already the fourth senior US representative to Beijing this year. By contrast, no high-ranking Chinese politician has visited the US this year.
Last fall, the Chinese leadership had briefly suspended talks with the USA out of anger over the visit to Taiwan by the then Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi. Now, numerous meetings are taking place once again. But the tone in Beijing remains cold. Above all, China is interested in the US finally lifting its Trump-era punitive tariffs.
Over the past months, the tenor in the state media has been that the Americans talk a lot, but do not keep their promises. On the one hand, one US minister comes after the other. On the other hand, however, new anti-Chinese restrictions are constantly being adopted in Washington.
Beijing is upset, but probably still has a strong interest in a milder Washington. After all, a lot of money is at stake. Despite relations being at a diplomatic low, trade between the two countries reached a record volume again last year at 690 billion US dollars. Although Raimondo said on Monday that the USA would not make any concessions on national security issues, a large part of the trade was not affected by this, she said.
The US Secretary of Commerce had a present for the Chinese even before her arrival. Six days before her trip, her department lifted restrictions on 27 Chinese companies. They were on a list that prevented them from buying US technology.
Several industrial companies are currently demonstrating how artificial intelligence (AI) can be harnessed as a tool. Using AI, it is comparatively easy to check one’s own database of thousands of suppliers for human rights violations. Particularly, companies doing business in China are currently exhibiting increasing interest in screening their suppliers – and their suppliers’ suppliers.
But whether this leads to an improvement on the ground is unlikely. “Technical tools can help us collect data on social and political problems more quickly. But they cannot solve these problems,” is Peter Pawlicki’s assessment of the development. He is Head of Outreach & Education at Electronics Watch, an organization working towards legally clean supply chains for the electronics industry.
Since last year, the car industry, in particular, has repeatedly had to face accusations of human rights violations in its supply chains. It is now also a highly relevant issue from a business perspective. After all, Germany already has a law that obliges companies to exercise due diligence in their supply chains. And an even stricter regulation is in the works at the EU level. Such legislation obliges large corporations to identify and prevent, end, or mitigate the negative impacts of their activities on human rights and the environment.
In addition, the study “Driving Force” by Sheffield Hallam University also played a significant role. The authors analyzed press releases and reports for evidence of forced labor in the Uyghur region of Xinjiang. The background is that the Communist Party has also lured industrial companies with the prospect of cheap workers from potential forced labor. What is considered a human rights violation in Europe is often a comparatively openly communicated subsidy measure in China.
The study authors cross-referenced these reports with what they knew about the company’s business partners. For instance, the Chinese aluminum producer Joinworld boasts that it counts BMW as a customer. Accordingly, it is highly likely that products made using forced labor are also found in German cars.
The AI mentioned earlier does the same work for large industrial companies. Only faster. It scours the internet and social media for reports on forced labor and environmental pollution and checks whether these violations have occurred in their own supply chain. The AI then classifies the suppliers using a traffic light system or school grading system:
What is astonishing is that it takes programmers only a few hours to put such an AI on its digital feet. Even if this means they have not yet been able to solve individual problems. For example, it is unclear how the AI comes to the respective conclusions in detail. It cannot yet name the sources on which its decision was based. The second problem is that the AI is mainly based on word combinations. The programmers cannot rule out the possibility that positive reports about forced labor praising companies are actually interpreted positively.
However, how the industry will use such AI software is still unclear. Pawlicki believes that its development is unlikely to have contributed to new insights. “If you as a company want to deliver high-quality products and follow up on problems, you have quality management. That alone should give them an excellent knowledge of strategic parts of their supply chain.” Since the 1990s, he says, companies have been aware of the fundamental human and labor rights problems in their supply chains.
“The problem is not to find out what the human rights and labor rights issues are, but also to address them. Most companies seem to shy away from this, possibly because it would be cost-driving,” Pawlicki clarifies. Ultimately, AI does not yet do more than analyze publicly available information. However, internal audits, which every company of this size has, went beyond this data.
Companies that would really work on improving the human rights situation would not do so of their own accord, but because human rights organizations or legislators exert pressure. “If you look at the sustainability reports of the biggest electronics companies in the world over the last few years, you repeatedly see extremely long working hours and extremely low wages. That’s what these companies report. But nothing changes.”
Therefore, another point is far more crucial for Pawlicki. “The question is: What is the goal of the investigation? Do you want to save costs with the investigation, or do you want to help the people concerned? If you want to save costs, the AI can help you. But the workers affected gain nothing from that,” Pawlicki warns.
According to the Japanese Ministry of Defense in Tokyo, a fighter jet was dispatched to monitor a Chinese military drone on Monday. A Chinese military drone of the type BZK-005 had been spotted flying between the Japanese island of Yonaguni and Taiwan. The spy drone reportedly originated in the East China Sea north of Taiwan and continued to the Bashi Channel between the southern coast of Taiwan and the Philippines.
An incident had already occurred on Friday when Japan dispatched several fighter jets of the Air Self-Defence Force after detecting Chinese bombers and drones. The two Chinese H-6 bombers flew near the Japanese island of Okinawa, while the drones were spotted near Taiwan. The incident takes on further dimensions because one of the largest US military bases in the region is located on Okinawa.
And there is no sign of easing in sight. On Monday, China announced plans to conduct joint military exercises with Singapore from the end of August to mid-September. Meanwhile, the US, South Korea and Japan are expanding their military cooperation. rad
Terry Gou is back on the campaign trail. Four years after his first attempt, the founder of Foxconn is taking another shot at Taiwan’s presidency, this time as an independent candidate. On Monday, the feisty entrepreneur, who assembles electronics as a contract manufacturer in the People’s Republic and earns billions, launched his campaign in a populist style. He promised 50 years of peace in the Taiwan Strait.
Gou as a bringer of peace – this attribute should suit an eccentric like him perfectly. As absurd as it may sound, the promise is not only meant to appeal to those who fear a military attack by the People’s Republic of China in the foreseeable future. It is meant to give all Taiwanese the feeling of being able to rid themselves of a threat from their aggressive neighbor in the long term.
All he would need to keep his promise is the people’s trust and four years. “Taiwan must not become Ukraine and I will not let Taiwan become the next Ukraine,” Gou said.
Gou’s conviction that he is the right man for the job comes from his entrepreneurial success. In the 1970s, he founded the electronics company Hon Hai Precision, which he later became one of the largest employers in the People’s Republic under the name Foxconn. In 1988, Gou opened the first production facility in Guangdong. In the following years, he played a significant role in China’s development into the world’s workbench.
Gou symbolizes the potential of Taiwanese entrepreneurship on Chinese soil without losing control of his empire. Taming the dragon – this message is supposed to convince the voters.
At times, more than 300,000 people were employed in its largest factories in China. Millions of migrant workers passed through his halls, chasing the promised wealth of the economic boom. The brutal conditions under which the people worked earned Gou harsh criticism 13 years ago.
A wave of suicides among Foxconn employees led to social policy reforms, resulting in increased minimum wages and limited working hours. It was Gou, of all people, who heralded the end of China as a low-wage economy. Today, parts of Foxconn’s production have been outsourced to India. Costs are simply lower there.
For the 72-year-old, the step into politics is the logical consequence of the growing influence of business on all facets of politics. On Monday, Gou proclaimed the beginning of “the era of entrepreneurs’ rule.”
The wisdom of entering the election campaign with this statement will show in November. According to election rules, Gou must have collected almost 300,000 signatures by then in order to qualify as an independent candidate. In times when many globally active companies are accused of greed and ruthlessness, overexploitation of nature, selling out universal human rights and inflationary green- and whitewashing, many might feel repulsed by such a statement.
The fact that Gou is entering the race as an independent presidential candidate is also partly because Taiwan’s largest opposition party, the Kuomintang, which traditionally pursues a pro-China course, has already rejected him. In his first attempt four years ago, Gou decided to drop out after it became clear that he could not win the nomination within the Kuomintang.
But even if Gou were only a second-tier candidate at the voting booths, he could potentially snatch valuable votes from the KMT as an independent candidate and thus play into the ruling DDP party’s hands. Marcel Grzanna
The serious side of life begins on the first day of school in China: In Qiannan in southern Guizhou province, hundreds of children were introduced to lessons on Monday as part of the first writing ceremony. The picture shows a bird’s eye view of boys and girls sitting at yellow desks. Next to each of them is a parent or other family member.
The visit of US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo to China has started without complications. It is telling that this already must be chalked up as a success, given the strained relations between China and the US. Raimondo stressed in Beijing on Monday that maintaining stable economic relations is of utmost importance.
Joern Petring lists the measures that have already been decided on the first day of the visit. Find out why aircraft manufacturer Boeing, of all companies, hopes for further positive steps in our first analysis.
Meanwhile, German car manufacturers, in particular, are coming under increasing criticism. The accusation is that human rights violations occur in their Chinese supply chains. With the German Supply Chain Act, at the latest, this accusation is no longer only morally but also legally relevant.
Artificial intelligence could provide help. In our ongoing AI series, Christian Domke Seidel shows how companies can use language-based AI to monitor their supply chains better and discover legal violations more quickly. This approach is particularly interesting for companies doing business in China.
In a sign of slightly easing tensions, China and the US have agreed to deepen their trade talks at the start of US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo’s visit to Beijing. “It is profoundly important that we have a stable economic relationship which is to the benefit of both of our countries and, in fact, what the world expects of us,” Raimondo said at a meeting with Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao in Beijing on Monday.
Raimondo, who will stay in China until Wednesday, spoke of “complicated” and “challenging” relations. At the same time, however, she expressed hope that at least gradual improvements were possible: “I believe we can make progress if we are direct, open, and practical.” Beijing was willing to “foster a more favorable policy environment for stronger cooperation” and “bolster bilateral trade and investment,” Wang replied.
According to the US, the two sides agreed on the following measures:
However, it is not yet clear whether the visit of the US Secretary of Commerce can be considered a success. It would send a clear signal if she were at least to meet with Chinese Premier Li Qiang. Such a high-ranking reception would demonstrate that Washington’s appeal to stabilize relations is heard in Beijing.
An announcement in connection with the US aircraft manufacturer Boeing would also be a success for the US. Raimondos is scheduled to travel to Shanghai on Tuesday, where a visit to the Boeing branch is apparently also planned. On Friday, Bloomberg reported that after more than four years, medium-haul 737 Max jets could soon be delivered to China again.
While Boeing’s crisis aircraft has long been authorized to fly again in many parts of the world after some technical improvements, China waited a long time for approval. It may well be that Raimondo will announce the resumption of deliveries to China once she is in Shanghai.
Most recently, the following dynamic between Washington and Beijing could be observed: The USA is pushing, and China remains skeptical. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited China in May, Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen in July, as did US Climate Change Envoy John Kerry. Raimondo is already the fourth senior US representative to Beijing this year. By contrast, no high-ranking Chinese politician has visited the US this year.
Last fall, the Chinese leadership had briefly suspended talks with the USA out of anger over the visit to Taiwan by the then Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi. Now, numerous meetings are taking place once again. But the tone in Beijing remains cold. Above all, China is interested in the US finally lifting its Trump-era punitive tariffs.
Over the past months, the tenor in the state media has been that the Americans talk a lot, but do not keep their promises. On the one hand, one US minister comes after the other. On the other hand, however, new anti-Chinese restrictions are constantly being adopted in Washington.
Beijing is upset, but probably still has a strong interest in a milder Washington. After all, a lot of money is at stake. Despite relations being at a diplomatic low, trade between the two countries reached a record volume again last year at 690 billion US dollars. Although Raimondo said on Monday that the USA would not make any concessions on national security issues, a large part of the trade was not affected by this, she said.
The US Secretary of Commerce had a present for the Chinese even before her arrival. Six days before her trip, her department lifted restrictions on 27 Chinese companies. They were on a list that prevented them from buying US technology.
Several industrial companies are currently demonstrating how artificial intelligence (AI) can be harnessed as a tool. Using AI, it is comparatively easy to check one’s own database of thousands of suppliers for human rights violations. Particularly, companies doing business in China are currently exhibiting increasing interest in screening their suppliers – and their suppliers’ suppliers.
But whether this leads to an improvement on the ground is unlikely. “Technical tools can help us collect data on social and political problems more quickly. But they cannot solve these problems,” is Peter Pawlicki’s assessment of the development. He is Head of Outreach & Education at Electronics Watch, an organization working towards legally clean supply chains for the electronics industry.
Since last year, the car industry, in particular, has repeatedly had to face accusations of human rights violations in its supply chains. It is now also a highly relevant issue from a business perspective. After all, Germany already has a law that obliges companies to exercise due diligence in their supply chains. And an even stricter regulation is in the works at the EU level. Such legislation obliges large corporations to identify and prevent, end, or mitigate the negative impacts of their activities on human rights and the environment.
In addition, the study “Driving Force” by Sheffield Hallam University also played a significant role. The authors analyzed press releases and reports for evidence of forced labor in the Uyghur region of Xinjiang. The background is that the Communist Party has also lured industrial companies with the prospect of cheap workers from potential forced labor. What is considered a human rights violation in Europe is often a comparatively openly communicated subsidy measure in China.
The study authors cross-referenced these reports with what they knew about the company’s business partners. For instance, the Chinese aluminum producer Joinworld boasts that it counts BMW as a customer. Accordingly, it is highly likely that products made using forced labor are also found in German cars.
The AI mentioned earlier does the same work for large industrial companies. Only faster. It scours the internet and social media for reports on forced labor and environmental pollution and checks whether these violations have occurred in their own supply chain. The AI then classifies the suppliers using a traffic light system or school grading system:
What is astonishing is that it takes programmers only a few hours to put such an AI on its digital feet. Even if this means they have not yet been able to solve individual problems. For example, it is unclear how the AI comes to the respective conclusions in detail. It cannot yet name the sources on which its decision was based. The second problem is that the AI is mainly based on word combinations. The programmers cannot rule out the possibility that positive reports about forced labor praising companies are actually interpreted positively.
However, how the industry will use such AI software is still unclear. Pawlicki believes that its development is unlikely to have contributed to new insights. “If you as a company want to deliver high-quality products and follow up on problems, you have quality management. That alone should give them an excellent knowledge of strategic parts of their supply chain.” Since the 1990s, he says, companies have been aware of the fundamental human and labor rights problems in their supply chains.
“The problem is not to find out what the human rights and labor rights issues are, but also to address them. Most companies seem to shy away from this, possibly because it would be cost-driving,” Pawlicki clarifies. Ultimately, AI does not yet do more than analyze publicly available information. However, internal audits, which every company of this size has, went beyond this data.
Companies that would really work on improving the human rights situation would not do so of their own accord, but because human rights organizations or legislators exert pressure. “If you look at the sustainability reports of the biggest electronics companies in the world over the last few years, you repeatedly see extremely long working hours and extremely low wages. That’s what these companies report. But nothing changes.”
Therefore, another point is far more crucial for Pawlicki. “The question is: What is the goal of the investigation? Do you want to save costs with the investigation, or do you want to help the people concerned? If you want to save costs, the AI can help you. But the workers affected gain nothing from that,” Pawlicki warns.
According to the Japanese Ministry of Defense in Tokyo, a fighter jet was dispatched to monitor a Chinese military drone on Monday. A Chinese military drone of the type BZK-005 had been spotted flying between the Japanese island of Yonaguni and Taiwan. The spy drone reportedly originated in the East China Sea north of Taiwan and continued to the Bashi Channel between the southern coast of Taiwan and the Philippines.
An incident had already occurred on Friday when Japan dispatched several fighter jets of the Air Self-Defence Force after detecting Chinese bombers and drones. The two Chinese H-6 bombers flew near the Japanese island of Okinawa, while the drones were spotted near Taiwan. The incident takes on further dimensions because one of the largest US military bases in the region is located on Okinawa.
And there is no sign of easing in sight. On Monday, China announced plans to conduct joint military exercises with Singapore from the end of August to mid-September. Meanwhile, the US, South Korea and Japan are expanding their military cooperation. rad
Terry Gou is back on the campaign trail. Four years after his first attempt, the founder of Foxconn is taking another shot at Taiwan’s presidency, this time as an independent candidate. On Monday, the feisty entrepreneur, who assembles electronics as a contract manufacturer in the People’s Republic and earns billions, launched his campaign in a populist style. He promised 50 years of peace in the Taiwan Strait.
Gou as a bringer of peace – this attribute should suit an eccentric like him perfectly. As absurd as it may sound, the promise is not only meant to appeal to those who fear a military attack by the People’s Republic of China in the foreseeable future. It is meant to give all Taiwanese the feeling of being able to rid themselves of a threat from their aggressive neighbor in the long term.
All he would need to keep his promise is the people’s trust and four years. “Taiwan must not become Ukraine and I will not let Taiwan become the next Ukraine,” Gou said.
Gou’s conviction that he is the right man for the job comes from his entrepreneurial success. In the 1970s, he founded the electronics company Hon Hai Precision, which he later became one of the largest employers in the People’s Republic under the name Foxconn. In 1988, Gou opened the first production facility in Guangdong. In the following years, he played a significant role in China’s development into the world’s workbench.
Gou symbolizes the potential of Taiwanese entrepreneurship on Chinese soil without losing control of his empire. Taming the dragon – this message is supposed to convince the voters.
At times, more than 300,000 people were employed in its largest factories in China. Millions of migrant workers passed through his halls, chasing the promised wealth of the economic boom. The brutal conditions under which the people worked earned Gou harsh criticism 13 years ago.
A wave of suicides among Foxconn employees led to social policy reforms, resulting in increased minimum wages and limited working hours. It was Gou, of all people, who heralded the end of China as a low-wage economy. Today, parts of Foxconn’s production have been outsourced to India. Costs are simply lower there.
For the 72-year-old, the step into politics is the logical consequence of the growing influence of business on all facets of politics. On Monday, Gou proclaimed the beginning of “the era of entrepreneurs’ rule.”
The wisdom of entering the election campaign with this statement will show in November. According to election rules, Gou must have collected almost 300,000 signatures by then in order to qualify as an independent candidate. In times when many globally active companies are accused of greed and ruthlessness, overexploitation of nature, selling out universal human rights and inflationary green- and whitewashing, many might feel repulsed by such a statement.
The fact that Gou is entering the race as an independent presidential candidate is also partly because Taiwan’s largest opposition party, the Kuomintang, which traditionally pursues a pro-China course, has already rejected him. In his first attempt four years ago, Gou decided to drop out after it became clear that he could not win the nomination within the Kuomintang.
But even if Gou were only a second-tier candidate at the voting booths, he could potentially snatch valuable votes from the KMT as an independent candidate and thus play into the ruling DDP party’s hands. Marcel Grzanna
The serious side of life begins on the first day of school in China: In Qiannan in southern Guizhou province, hundreds of children were introduced to lessons on Monday as part of the first writing ceremony. The picture shows a bird’s eye view of boys and girls sitting at yellow desks. Next to each of them is a parent or other family member.
