Just links today, Happy Labor Day to my American readers:

THE ESSENTIAL EIGHT

Zhou Yongkang, former security tsar linked to Bo Xilai, faces corruption probe | South China Morning Post Current and retired top leaders endorsed the decision earlier this month during the secretive annual party meeting at the resort of Beidaihe in Hebei province. According to sources familiar with the leadership’s thinking, President Xi Jinping and his administration are determined to use the case to galvanise the anti-graft campaign. No Politburo Standing Committee member – retired or sitting – has been investigated for economic crimes since the end of the Cultural Revolution nearly 40 years ago. Sources said top leaders made the decision in view of the rising anger inside the party at the scale of the corruption problem and the vast fortune that Zhou’s family has amassed. Xi ordered officials in charge of the case to “get to the bottom of it”. // Huge if true

Related: Teams from Gov’t, Party Investigate CNPC Executives – Caixin Several teams from the central government’s audit czar and Communist Party discipline watchdog are investigating executives at China National Petroleum Corp., sources close to the matter say. The dispatching of investigators from both the party and the government parallels the downfall of four high-level executives in the country’s largest oil company over two days. Part of the teams’ job is a routine, post-promotion check regarding Jiang Jiemin, former general manager of China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC), after he was elevated to the helm of State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission. But sources say the teams are also investigating other executives at the oil giant.

Oil giants barred from new projects after missing pollution targets | South China Morning Post China’s largest oil and gas producer, PetroChina, has been barred from expanding its refining and chemical production capacity. The Ministry of Environmental Protection said yesterday the energy giant had failed to meet its target for cutting chemical oxygen demand (COD) – a measure of organic pollutants from waste water in rivers and lakes…Another state energy giant, China Petroleum & Chemical (Sinopec), missed its target for reducing nitrogen oxide emissions. The ministry said it had halted all environmental impact approvals for construction of refineries and chemical plants by the two companies as well as overhaul and expansion projects, apart from those that would upgrade fuel quality, conserve energy and cut pollution.

Related: Sinopec to Lift Fuel Standards Ahead of Schedule – Economic Observer  Sinopec, one of China’s three state-owned oil giants, yesterday announced that it will start providing fuel that meets China’s “National IV” fuel standard from Oct 1, three months earlier than planned. In addition, the company says that it will start supplying “National V” standard fuel to 14 cities, including Shanghai and Nanjing on the same date. Throughout most of mainlaind China the government currently requires gas stations to supply a minimum “National III” standard of fuel.

[视频]北京警方查明网络大V薛蛮子嫖娼且涉嫌聚众淫乱_新闻频道_央视网 　Thursday CCTV Evening news does a nearly 3 minute segment on Big V Xue Manzi’s Arrest // 央视网消息（新闻联播）：日前，北京警方根据群众举报，在朝阳区安慧北里一带连续端掉多个卖淫嫖娼窝点，抓获违法犯罪嫌疑人员27名。其中，广受外界关注的网络大V“薛蛮子”，中文名“薛必群”，被警方当场抓获，经进一步查明，他不仅嫖娼，还涉嫌聚众淫乱。目前案件正在审查中。// Guess he should not have been so vocal in criticizing the Shanghai court officials who were caught with prostitutes?

Related: Graphics: Police Campaign against Spread of ‘Net Rumors’ Intensifies – Caixin The national campaign has intensified since mid-August, when Beijing police closed a company called Er Ma China, which was accused of spreading rumors on the Net, and arrested two men. The company serves as a sort of press agent for people who want to become Internet celebrities. Then on August 20, the Ministry of Public Security escalated the campaign, stepping up efforts to, as they say, address the dissemination of false information on the Internet. Shanghai police have investigated more than 380 cases and launched inquiries into 170 people. And in the central province of Henan, police have investigated 463 cases and made 131 arrests since mid-June 18, officials say. This week, Zhejiang police warned that spreading rumors on WeChat, a widely used instant messaging and social networking service, is also illegal.

Related: 抓大V，各地在行动！_UGC精选 编者按：新浪微博四周年了，这可不是一个美妙的时刻，支撑它高人气的“大V们”要么忙删帖，要么噤声，更有甚者被抓捕。官方媒体轮番放言：要撕下“大V们”伪君子的面纱，各地公安则前赴后继地予以打击，如此情景，真应了那句话：互联网不是法外之地。

Related: State media says crackdown on rumours should include offending officials | South China Morning Post Xinhua listed four examples of “official rumours” in its article yesterday. It pointed to the National Energy Administration, which late last year said a veteran journalist’s claim that former director Liu Tienan was tied to fraud was “sheer slander”. Liu was eventually sacked and is under criminal investigation for suspected bribe-taking. The other three examples involved local government agencies, all of which had in the past denied online allegations about their staff but were proved to be true by later investigations.// 新华社“中国网事”盘点“官谣”

Related: 武汉网络造谣公司控312个“大V” 获利超百万元_网易新闻中心 Internet police bust a “Internet rumor-mongering” company in Wuhan, detain 27 people. Reports say the company had 312 “big V” accounts which had 220 million followers in total. So where is Sina in all this? They grant the V status, they have the Weibo activity data…How many companies who have moved marketing budgets online were actually paying for fake and manipulated activity on Weibo and other social media? Where are the social media marketing analysis firms in all of this?// 昨天，武汉市公安局通报，警方成功打掉一个网上造谣炒作公司，抓获27名不法人员，唐某、孙某等主要犯罪嫌疑人被刑事拘留。更令人吃惊的是，此公司的600余名“枪手”分布于28个省市，并且拥有312个“大V”，粉丝累计达到2.2亿！

Malaysia Splits With Asean Claimants on China Sea Threat – Bloomberg “Just because you have enemies, doesn’t mean your enemies are my enemies,” Hishammuddin said on the sidelines of meetings with counterparts from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as well as the U.S. The Chinese “can patrol every day, but if their intention is not to go to war” it is of less concern, he said. “I think we have enough level of trust that we will not be moved by day-to-day politics or emotions.”

Related: ‘Don’t flaunt ASEAN banner’ on the S. China Sea issue |Asia-Pacific |chinadaily.com.cn The top Chinese diplomat said on Thursday that China opposes certain ASEAN member nations “trying to tout their own stand as that of the regional organization” on the South China Sea issue, which will certainly harm common interests between China and ASEAN. Foreign Minister Wang Yi made the remarks at a news conference after the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, held in celebration of the 10th anniversary of their strategic partnership.

Related: Chinese DM: freedom of navigation in South China Sea unaffected – Xinhua The Chinese Defense Ministry on Thursday warned relevant countries against seeking private interests under the guise of freedom of navigation in the South China Sea. The ministry added that freedom of navigation has never been affected by territorial and ocean rights disputes between the countries concerned. Defense Ministry spokesman Yang Yujun made the remarks at a monthly press briefing in response to a question about a vow by the United States and the Philippines to protect freedom of navigation in Southeast Asia.

Related: China snubs Philippines’ Aquino by asking him to postpone trip | Reuters China has asked Philippine President Benigno Aquino to postpone a visit next week for the opening of a trade fair, Manila said on Thursday, an unprecedented snub by Beijing as relations sour over territorial disputes in the South China Sea.

Luxury mooncakes lose attraction amid frugality drive – Xinhua  and no more mooncake boxes stuffed with cash instead of the cakes? //  “We usually would have sold mooncakes worth half a million yuan by this time in previous years, but this year we have only netted tens of thousands of yuan,” complained Li Aihua, who owns an online mooncake franchise shop in Chengdu, capital of southwest China’s Sichuan Province. “Few people are interested in mooncake gift packages worth 500 yuan (81 U.S. dollars) or above, while purchases by government organizations in large quantities are hardly seen anymore,” Li said. The unpopularity of the luxury mooncakes followed a meeting of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Commission for Discipline Inspection last week.

Related: 商务部：除03年“非典”外 全国餐饮收入创1991以来最低值 | 每经网 Other than 2003 SARS year, China’s restaurant revenue is at its lowest since 1991, thanks to government austerity and anti-corruption campaigns// “中国餐饮行业发展面临前所未有的严峻形势。” 商务部发言人姚坚在今天上午举行的发布会透露，2013年全国餐饮收入是除2003年“非典”外创下了自1991年以来的最低值。

Related: 白酒告别“疯狂十年” 深度报道——经济参考网 Economic Information special report on the end of the “crazy 10 years” of growth for the baijiu industry…

Scare or no scare, customers have little choice but Fonterra | Reuters However much China and other big customers strive to rely less on Fonterra after a global food contamination scare this month – now downscaled to a ‘false alarm’ – the New Zealand firm’s grip on the global dairy trade is unlikely to be loosened. //not clear how China officialdom reacting to the news that fonterra did not actually have a problem

Related: 恒天然毒奶粉事件惊天逆转：下游企业或损失上亿|恒天然|毒奶粉_21世纪网 恒天然集团突然对外宣称，新西兰政府委托进行的后续独立检测确认，恒天然浓缩乳清蛋白原料以及包括婴幼儿奶粉在内的使用该原料的产品均不含肉毒杆菌。

China Seeks Western-Style Care Amid Explosion of Elderly – Bloomberg While China spent 1.1 trillion yuan ($179.7 billion) over the past four years to cut the cost of drugs and provide basic medical coverage for more than 90 percent of its 1.3 billion people, services for the elderly have fallen behind. To plug the gap, Premier Li Keqiang said Aug. 16 the government will cut red tape and costs to spur foreign investment into the type of privately funded care that is common in the West.

Well-Off Chinese Students Summer in U.S., Seeking an Edge – NYTimes.com By some estimates, more than 100,000 Chinese students, some as young as 10, flocked to the United States this summer to delve into American life and culture. Some studied diligently in programs designed to improve their SAT scores. Others kicked back and enjoyed more leisurely pursuits, on group tours that visited Las Vegas, New York and Disneyland. Some attended outdoor camps. // on the flight back from DC last week I sat next to two kids from Yantai who had paid 40k RMB each for a 2 week US tour arranged by New Oriental…they were looking forward to getting home and having a good meal

 

BUSINESS AND ECONOMY

ICBC Leads Top China Banks to Record Profits as Economy Weakens – Bloomberg Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd. (601398) led the nation’s biggest banks in posting faster-than-estimated second-quarter profit growth by containing bad loans and selling more wealth management products. The four banks, among the world’s nine biggest by market value, reported record combined net income of 216 billion yuan ($35.2 billion), an increase of 15 percent from a year earlier, according to data compiled by Bloomberg News. That accelerated from an 11 percent increase in the first quarter.

China banks seek to shake off bad loans – FT.com Analysts expect the number of problem loans to continue to rise as a result of a credit boom on the mainland since 2008, which will mean some have to raise fresh capital. Investors are taking a pessimistic view on bad loans with share prices suggesting a much bigger rise in bad loans than most analysts expect. “We forecast the Chinese banks will face NPL formation of 9 per cent cumulatively over the coming 3-4 years, much lower than the scenario currently being priced into the Chinese banks’ [shares],” said Mike Werner of Bernstein Research in Hong Kong.

Attack on shadow banking delivers Pyrrhic victory | Reuters Central bank data shows that bank lending staged a dramatic comeback in recent months, with the proportion of bank loans in all new credit rising in July to 86.5 percent of what China calls total social financing, or TSF. That’s more than double what it was as recently as March. “This marks a failure, albeit perhaps a temporary one, for the official drive to push corporates to rely primarily on the market for fundraising,” said a senior money market dealer at a state-owned bank in Beijing, who asked not to be named because he is not authorised to speak to the media.

China Rongsheng Seeks Funding as Ship Order Slump Cuts Cash – Bloomberg The shipyard will have sufficient funds to meet obligations over the next one year, based on a review of its cash-flow projections, the company said yesterday. Rongsheng’s ability to raise funds and meet payments will determine how much China needs to intervene in the sector after the government earlier this month issued a three-year package to support the troubled shipbuilding industry, the world’s biggest.

地方政府买外资成风：每100万美元售价17万元人民币_财经频道_一财网 First Financial report on some localities buying “fake foreign investment” to meet targets…no good grasp of overall scale…government starting to crack down // 在全民招商的浪潮下，层层摊派的引资任务迫使某些地方形成“买外资”产业链，地方政绩耀眼，中介乐得赚钱，留下的却是一本财政烂账。

人民日报详解为何路虎车英国卖83万国内卖320万|进口车|汽车|价格_新浪财经_新浪网 People’s Daily explains why a Land Rover that costs 830k RMB in the UK costs 3.2M RMB in China. Tata can’t be pleased, not the first People’s Daily mention of Land Rover’s absurd China prices

“专项引领新兴产业”获高层认可 新华社——经济参考网 三个备选项目上报国务院；支持民营企业承担重大专项…记者最新获悉，科技支持战略性新兴产业的政策框架成型。由科技部等有关部门论证和起草的“国家重大科技专项引领战略性新兴产业发展”专题报告，最近已得到高层认可。由此，这一政策举措将成为国家支持战略性新兴产业发展的重大战略。与此同时，新材料、航空发动机与燃气轮机、页岩气三个备选专项也已上报国务院。

China Economic Watch | Rebalancing China’s Railway Sector Policy makers must balance the longer term benefits of a more efficient railway sector with the short term pain higher logistics costs will impose on the industrial sector. There are also geopolitical concerns. For example, a higher logistics costs will lead industrial producers to substitute cheaper imports for domestic raw materials. This is why the latest policy commitment only moved railway prices from a “government-set” scheme to a “government-guided” scheme, meaning prices will only be allowed to fluctuate around a pricing benchmark set by the NDRC. Nonetheless, the State Council approved document is a high level acknowledgement that freight price reform is an integral part of China’s railway sector reforms. The improvement to freight pricing, even if gradual, will turnaround declining returns and improve the outlook for China’s railway sector moving forward.

New Billionaire Makes Money From Vietnam-China Cotton Gap – Bloomberg A textile maker’s cost-cutting move to shift cotton production to Vietnam has ignited a yearlong rally in its stock, minting a new billionaire in China. Shares of Shanghai-based Texhong Textile Group Ltd. (2678) have soared 445 percent in the past 12 months, boosting the wealth of its co-founder and largest shareholder Hong Tianzhu to $1 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Hong, 45, hasn’t appeared on any wealth ranking. He owns almost 62 percent of Texhong, which is traded in Hong Kong.

Law Proposal for Shanghai FTZ ‘Not a Free Pass for Foreigners’ – Caixin Suspending the laws will allow foreign investors to be treated just like Chinese when they set up a joint venture or cooperate with a local enterprise in the FTZ, said Wang Zhile, an economics and trade expert with the ministry. Currently, doing so requires the foreign investors to prepare a feasibility report, get the ministry’s approval and register with local branches of the industry and commerce administration. Setting up a Chinese company requires only the last step, he said. The proposal suggests removing and changing 11 administrative procedures targeted at foreign companies investing in the country. The procedures are mandatory under the laws. That is why the laws need to be suspended in the FTZ, the proposal says.

JPMorgan Bribe Probe Said to Expand in Asia as Spreadsheet Is Found – Bloomberg A probe of JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s (JPM) hiring practices in China has uncovered red flags across Asia, including an internal spreadsheet that linked appointments to specific deals pursued by the bank, people with knowledge of the matter said.

China Aims to Expand Property Tax-Caijing China aims to expand a property tax beyond Shanghai and Chongqing as part of a broader reform agenda in the world’s second-largest economy. The news was delivered by both finance minister Lou Jiwei, and director Xu Shaoshi with the National Development and Reform Commission, the country’s top economic planning agency, at yesterday’s regular State Council meeting. The government is facing “relatively large” pressure in curbing a housing price rebound, with “prominent” fiscal imbalances and increasing risks in the financial sector, Xu said. To extend the property tax was among his initiatives to push ahead with reforms in major areas in his report. // good luck with this considering many cities refusing to put their local housing data into a nationwide database, as they have been ordered to multiple times–500个城市住房信息联网再次延迟 官方未公布进展_网易新闻中心 

 

POLITICS AND LAW

Cultural Revolution: Time to say sorry | The Economist To help blacken Mr Bo’s name, internet censors have kept their hands off articles like this one (in Chinese) repeating quite possibly inaccurate rumours that Mr Bo beat his own high-ranking father, Bo Yibo, during the Cultural Revolution after the elder Mr Bo was purged for disloyalty to Mao. But there is no sign that the leadership wants a wider discussion. Political reform, as called for by the ineffectual Mr Wen, is not expected to be on the agenda of a much-anticipated meeting of the party’s Central Committee which party leaders announced, just a day after Mr Bo’s trial, would be held in November.

人民日报：客观认识当代中国与外部世界-时政频道-新华网 鲁迅先生说：“惟有民魂是值得宝贵的，惟有他发扬起来，中国才有真进步。”全面把握中国的历史与现实，客观认识当代中国与外部世界，才能更好地汲取我们的民族精神、民族魂，更好地走向并融入世界，凝聚起实现中华民族伟大复兴“中国梦”的磅礴力量。

Teng Biao–The Confessions of a Reactionary « China change We are calculating, at any given moment, the ratio of the spirit and the flesh in our lives. I am scared of death but am courting it; I’m indomitable but fainthearted at the same time. Every moment of my life is brimming with happiness, but just as much of it is imbued with pain. Such are the confessions of a reactionary.

Bulldozer kills girl in China amid land grab dispute: media | Reuters A bulldozer killed a four-year-old girl in southeastern China after her family resisted a land grab, a major cause of unrest in the country, Chinese media reported on Thursday, sparking online outrage. Hong Xiaorou was killed in Fujian province when the bulldozer hit her on Wednesday despite her grandmother screaming for the vehicle to stop, a provincial government-run news website said.

 

FOREIGN AND DEFENSE AFFAIRS

More carriers likely in China |Society |chinadaily.com.cn It’s been less than a year since the Liaoning, the Chinese navy’s first aircraft carrier, was put into active service, but a Defense Ministry spokesman is promising that there will be more carriers in the future. On Thursday, Colonel Yang Yujun said at a news conference that China will consider developing aircraft carriers in accordance with its national defense needs.  // 国防部：辽宁舰绝对不是中国军队唯一航母_网易新闻中心 中新网8月29日电 29日下午，国防部召开例行记者会，国防部新闻事务局副局长、新闻发言人杨宇军上校指出，辽宁舰是中国第一艘航母，但绝对不是唯一的一艘。

Inside the Ring: Air Force on China threat – Washington Times Gen. Carlisle said the Air Force is not planning on building more bases in the Asia Pacific as part of the shift. Instead, the service’s buzz phrase is “places, not bases,” where Air Force power can be used in the region. The general then compared the rotation of warplanes in and out of Asia to the Cold War policy of moving U.S. forces temporarily to Europe to deal with the Soviet Union. That comment prompted an unusual attack from state-controlled Chinese media. Beijing published more than a dozen reports criticizing the general.

‘Black budget’ summary details U.S. spy network’s successes, failures and objectives – The Washington Post •The governments of Iran, China and Russia are difficult to penetrate, but North Korea’s may be the most opaque. There are five “critical” gaps in U.S. intelligence about Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs, and analysts know virtually nothing about the intentions of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un….Other blank spots include questions about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear components when they are being transported, the capabilities of China’s next-generation fighter aircraft, and how Russia’s government leaders are likely to respond to “potentially destabilizing events in Moscow, such as large protests and terrorist attacks.”

Japanese-language schools see sharp decrease in Chinese students – AJW by The Asahi Shimbun Japan has seen a sharp drop in the number of Chinese students at domestic Japanese-language schools following the nuclear disaster and new flareup over territory. The Association for the Promotion of Japanese Language Education said that although there were 29,271 Chinese students enrolled in its 400 member schools as of July 1, 2010, the number exactly two years later had dropped to 18,093

 

HONG KONG, MACAO AND TAIWAN

Top U.S. Diplomat Gets Language Lessons in Hong Kong – China Real Time Report – WSJ He also identified himself as being from the U.S. state of Virginia, which the consul general’s social media team transliterated as “弗吉尼亞” (pronounced fo ji ni ya in Mandarin and fut gut nei ah in Cantonese) That transliteration is widely used in Mandarin, which is spoken in most parts of mainland China and has increasingly been used in Hong Kong since the city returned to Chinese rule in 1997, with its major newspapers and even its government adopting the term. However, unfortunately for Mr. Hart, the term in Cantonese—which is spoken by the overwhelming majority of Hong Kong residents—also sounds roughly like a vulgar, innuendo-laced insult.

中方当面“警告”美驻港新领事不要干涉香港内政_网易新闻中心 Beijing’s rep in Hong Kong warns the new US Consul General there to not interfere in Hong Kong internal affairs…// 【环球时报综合报道】中国外交部驻港特派员宋哲日前与美国驻港总领事克利福德·哈特(中文名夏千福)会面时，当面“警告”他不要干涉香港内政。中国政府就香港政改对美方严词相向已非首次，外界认为，这是香港回归以来北京发出的“最强硬信号”。香港媒体给出的原因是，上任才一个月的美国驻港总领事“到香港基层探求民意的密集程度，比特首梁振英还要多”，甚至在履新伊始就公开鼓动民主派参加2017年特首选举。

 

TECH AND MEDIA

At Huawei, Reality Check Pushes Wages Higher – Caixin Competition for fresh-faced university graduates is heating up in China’s telecom sector now that electronics equipment giant Huawei Technologies Co. has significantly hiked salaries for certain white collar employees…First-year worker and junior executive paychecks were pushed up by as much as 35 percent in August following a July 29 announcement by the Shenzhen-based company…Of the estimated 7,000 students who graduate from these top schools every year, foreign Internet companies hire about 100, said Wei. Chinese Internet giants such as Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent attract up to 3,000 graduates annually, while IT firms and banks take about 1,000 from these schools and domestic telecom operators hire nearly 1,000.

Xiaomi’s Bin Lin on Hiring Hugo Barra, International Expansion – Ina Fried – Mobile – AllThingsD Barra will be a key part of that, Xiaomi co-founder Bin Lin said in a phone interview on Thursday. “He has a keen understanding of the product itself, what features work globally,” Lin said. Lin, who previously worked at Google, said he has known Barra since 2008 — shortly after he joined Google. The two have been collaborating more closely since Xiaomi phones hit the market in 2011. “From our perspective, it is a great addition to the team,” Lin said. It was only this year that Xiaomi began selling outside mainland China, but Lin said that, with Barra’s help, the company hopes to expand to other countries late this year or early next year.

Qihoo says its $550 million bond sale is NOT to buy Sogou–TechInAsia

 

SOCIETY, ART, SPORTS, CULTURE AND HISTORY

A Yang Fudong Restrospective at the Berkeley Art Museum – NYTimes.com One recent morning, in a sunny office at the Berkeley Art Museum, the artist Yang Fudong came across as this Hollywood vision of himself, all brush-painted poet meets editing suite. Mr. Yang, a 41-year-old from Shanghai, makes arcane movies and video installations, mostly black and white and always plotless, that have won him the full retrospective — his first — at the museum here through Dec. 8.

探秘十三陵守陵武警部队：新兵夜遇绣花鞋险吓瘫(图)_资讯频道_凤凰网  stories from the PAP guards as the Ming Tombs. I would not want to work there at night // 自古以来，皇陵地宫都是盗墓贼眼中的首选目标。北京昌平燕山脚下的十三陵，是世界上埋葬帝王最多的墓群。为了更好地保护这一文化遗产，我武警官兵在上世纪80年代进驻十三陵，担负皇家陵墓守卫任务。他们三十年如一日，在朦胧而又神秘的面纱下，忠实履行着“守陵人”的使命。记者日前来到武警北京总队八支队七中队驻地，记录这支神秘守陵部队背后的艰辛。

 

ENERGY, ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE AND HEALTH

90% of China’s new HIV infections through sex – Xinhua | English.news.cn According to Wu Zunyou, director of the HIV/AIDS division of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 70 percent of all new cases reported as of June resulted from heterosexual practices, and 20 percent through homosexual contact…With an estimated 48,000 to 50,000 new HIV/AIDS infections every year, Wu said the government aims to reduce new infections by 25 percent and HIV/AIDS mortality by 30 percent by the end of 2015.

Chinese researchers identify key protein behind depression – Xinhua Chinese researchers said Thursday that they have identified a key protein in the brain responsible for the development of depression, offering a fresh avenue in the search for therapies to treat depression… The researchers reported in the U.S. journal Science that a protein called CaM was nearly twice as abundant in the depressed rats.

 

FOOD AND TRAVEL

United asks DOT for San Francisco-Chengdu nonstop If approved for the route, United plans to fly it with Boeing 787-8 Dreamliners. United has proposed flights begin on June 9…Flying times will be approximately 14 hours, 15 minutes westbound and 13 hours, 50 minutes eastbound.

Vineyards pour billions into chateaus|Economy|chinadaily.com.cn Leading Chinese vineyards are constructing chateaus at a furious pace as they strive to catch up with world-famous premium wineries whose products are pouring into the nation, sparking concerns of a boom that may go bust. There are already more than 160 chateaus in China, and about 200 more are under construction

Why Do Chinese Tourists Have Such A Bad Rep? Ctd « The Dish

 

BEIJING

Beijing Water Shortage Worse Than the Middle East | ChinaFile The per capita annual water availability is now around 120 cubic meters, well below the United Nations absolute water scarcity threshold, and puts China’s capital city in a position of more severe water scarcity than some countries in the arid Middle-East. Statistics from Beijing Water Resources Bulletin shows that the decrease in the capital’s water supplies results mainly from the rapid decline in surface and underground water resources. In recent years, water supplies from these two sources have decreased by 38%.