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According to the 2022 China Business Climate Survey Report jointly released by the American Chamber of Commerce in China (AmCham China) and accounting firm PwC, around 60 percent of companies surveyed said they made profits in China in 2021; two thirds of these intend to increase their investment in China this year. COVER STORY COVER STORY Spring 2022 can be described as one of "ups and downs" for the people of Shenzhen, a global tech metropolis in the southern province of Guangdong. The digital economy has become a main driver in China's high-quality and innovation-driven growth, according to Lu Benfu, Vice Chairman of the China Institute for Innovation & Development Strategy. [Extracted from the article]

COVER STORY Soon after graduation, Wu Mengwei, an electronic and information engineering major, followed his passion and became a writer contributing to online novel websites. Due to difficulties in determining labor relations, high job mobility, and complications in investigating and obtaining evidence for work-related accidents, most flex workers have long been unable to enjoy work-related injury insurance benefits. [Extracted from the article]

Li Jing, a research fellow with the Institute of Botany at CAS, said though China is an agricultural country, its seed technol¬ogy lags behind developed countries'. Regarding the housing issue in big cities, the meeting directed ensuring af¬fordable rental housing and regulating the long-term rental housing market. The meeting emphasized the de¬velopment of non-profit rental housing and improvement of long-term rental housing policy. [Extracted from the article]

From FTZ to FTP The year 2020 is the first one to start building the Hainan Pilot FTP, according to a briefing by the Hainan Provincial Government in December. Hainan should speed up opening its service market, shorten its negative list for foreign investment, and reduce trade barriers in the service sector to transform into an innovation-driven FTP with flourishing service trade. UIBE's Sang said Hainan should improve its trade and investment liberalization and facilitation, and reduce tariff to zero in the goods trade. [Extracted from the article]

It has seen steady development with a huge market, and we look forward to being part of its growth", Kazuyuki Tawara, President of Nachi-Fujikoshi (China) Co., told Beijing Review. For Lionel Thomas, Deputy General Manager and Sales Executive Manager of Atermes, the Chinese market is familiar since his company has been cooperating with a firm in Chengdu in southwest China's Sichuan Province for about 16 years. "To drive up imports, China also needs to further lower import tariffs, enhance financial services to achieve the full convertibility of the yuan, and improve payment methods and logistics", Xu said. [Extracted from the article]

The article reports that the Items reformation in restricting foreign investment on the list for pilot free trade zones (FTZs) and the non-FTZ areas in China, will expand the country's market access and allow foreign investors to run wholly-owned businesses. It Informs about administrative measures for foreign investment market access, and discusses speeding up the domestic service industry by widening market access to meet rising domestic demand and drive high-quality economic growth.

Zhang Xuying, a researcher with the China Population and Development Research Center (CPDRC), told Chinanews.com that China still has population advantages as the size of the newly added labor force will continue increasing every year until 2035. FEATURES China's overall population fell by 850,000 year on year to 1.4118 billion in 2022, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) announced on January 17. On the supply side, although labor supply shrinks during negative population growth, the demand for labor also eases as production efficiency improves through the upgrading of the labor force quality and technological innovation. [Extracted from the article]

In response, several Fed officials argued the economy is still able to tolerate higher borrowing costs. Spillover effects Whatever policy the Fed chooses, it's unlikely to bolster the U.S. real economy, Mei Xinyu, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation under the Ministry of Commerce, told Global Times. FEATURES Negative growth, abnormal yield curve, loss of confidence among businesses - Is the U.S. economy headed for a recession?. [Extracted from the article]

"Many new occupations are attractive to university graduates and become new choices for their future career", said Li Chang'an, a professor at the School of Public Administration at the University of International Business and Economics, who focuses on labor and educational economics. He said some of the new occupations are upgrades of the traditional ones, like express delivery service people, while others are brand new ones born with new business forms such as blockchain engineering technicians and online marketers. FEATURES TRENDS Xia Min is excited to see on the news that an occupation called parenting instructor might soon gain official recognition from China's human resources authority. [Extracted from the article]

Li Feng said relevant policies should be upgraded in pace with the fast development of flex working, and labor unions should play a bigger role in protecting flexible worker rights and settling their disputes with employers or other relevant parties. COVER STORY Growing up in a small village in Yongjia County, Zhejiang Province, Li Feng has worked his way up from truck driver to purchasing manager at a large hi-tech enterprise in Shanghai. "Many companies in Shanghai have also adopted a no-layoff policy and ensured their staff gets paid, no matter whether they are working from home or in quarantine", Li Feng said. [Extracted from the article]

FEATURES As the COVID-19 pandemic rants and raves on, China has maintained its opening-up efforts throughout 2021 and now into 2022. Liu stressed that the participation of foreign firms is vital for the development of China's manufacturing industry. "In addition to meeting the calls of foreign investors, easier market access also helps improve China's market system and boosts domestic demand", Liu Xiangdong, a researcher at the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, told business portal Yicai.com. [Extracted from the article]

China established its first free trade zone, the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone, in 2013 and, by September 2020, had established a total of 21 free trade zones across the country. Twenty years on, China has grown to become a crucial participant in and contributor to WTO restructuring and the rewriting of international trade rules. The China closing International ceremony of Import the Fourth Expo (CIIE) took place in Shanghai on November 10. [Extracted from the article]

Engst has spent half his life in China and half in the U.S., before returning to China in 2007. Hinton by her own example demonstrated another side of the CPC and the Chinese nation overall, and became a bridge between China and the West", Zhao Yuezhi, a professor at Tsinghua University, said at the event. FEATURES PROFILE Joan Hinton never could have imagined that China would become the destination of her lifetime. [Extracted from the article]

In Macao, renting a 30-squaremeter bay-side apartment will cost roughly 10,000 Macao pataca ($1,248), whereas in Hengqin, residents can rent a three-bedroom apartment for a mere 4,000 yuan ($620), according to Leong. COVER STORY Before University graduating of International from the Business and Economics in Beijing in 2015, Leong Ka-seng, a Macao entrepreneur, visited Hengqin Island in Guangdong Province to look for career development prospects. As a matter of fact, allowing a greater number of Macao-registered vehicles into Hengqin is one of the concrete steps stemming from the supportive measures promoted by the Central Government to boost the development prospects of Macao and Guangdong-Macao cooperation. [Extracted from the article]

That day he registered his consultancy company in the Jinzhan International Cooperation Service Zone, a component of the international business service section of the China (Beijing) Pilot Free Trade Zone (FTZ). FEATURES BEIJING FTZ March 16 marked an important milestone for Beijing-based entrepreneur Wahed Ahmadzai. Ahmadzai describes himself as a community builder and, for him, N HUB and the ATA are new communities for the Beijing FTZ. [Extracted from the article]

For instance, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is formulating a world-class city cluster with the capital of Beijing at its core. The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area looks poised to bring into play the role of Hong Kong and Macao as key hubs of the Belt and Road Initiative. China's new development pattern of dual circulation, which takes the domestic market as its mainstay and allows for domestic and foreign markets to reinforce each other, involves several implications for this strategy. [Extracted from the article]

BUSINESS MARKET WATCH Wang Wei and his family live in the subtropical city of Haikou, Hainan Province in south China. Data released by the China Internet Network Information Center showed as of June, China had more than 940 million Internet users, about one fifth of the global total. (Source: Xinhua News Agency) GRAPH: On-Demand Economy Booms With Tech Drive GRAPH: On-Demand Economy Booms With Tech Drive GRAPH: On-Demand Economy Booms With Tech Drive PHOTO (COLOR). [Extracted from the article]

BUSINESS U.S. electric carmaker Tesla's CEO Elon Musk must be a happy man with the company's second quarter (Q2) performance in China proving his wisdom in choosing the Chinese market. The foreign equity limit on securities firms, securities investment fund management companies, futures companies and life insurance corporations has been removed, which means wholly foreign-owned financial institutions have been given access to the Chinese market. This will further optimize the business environment, consolidate the attractiveness and cohesion of China's ultra-large market, and create Chinese companies that are competitive both at home and in overseas markets. [Extracted from the article]

BUSINESS On January 28, the fourth day of the Chinese New Year holiday, Jiang Xueying, owner of a children's clothing and accessories store, became a vlogger, live-streaming her products on Kuaishou, a leading short video-sharing app that has evolved into a popular live-streaming platform. Under the partnership, Kuaishou users will be able to buy select JD.com products directly on the video app. Kuaishou's association with JD.com dates back to June 2019, when its users could buy select JD.com products on the app. [Extracted from the article]

WORLD On March 24, U.S. President Donald Trump asked for medical equipment and test kits in a 23-minute phone call with Moon Jae-in, President of the Republic of Korea (ROK). The U.S. took a different approach compared with the efforts to contain the virus in many other countries like the ROK and China. When China was hard-hit by the virus, Columbia University professor Walter Ian Lipkin, known as one of the world's leading "virus hunters", arrived in China in January to assist with the efforts to contain its spread. [Extracted from the article]

BUSINESS Usually, the first three months of the year are the high season for the insurance industry, But this year, because of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, most insurance firms' meetings with their clients have been canceled. "This epidemic will accelerate the establishment of online insurance sales channels, and information technology-based insurance product innovation will also speed up. Under the mobile and digital trends, insurance companies will increase investment in insurance technologies, which will bring more vigor and impetus to the industry", the report said. [Extracted from the article]

The appellate body of the World Trade Organization (WTO) expired on December 11, 2019, since the member countries could not reach consensus on appointing new judges. As Jennifer Hillman, a former U.S, member of the appellate body, said, an effective WTO dispute settlement mechanism would have a deterrent effect on members who broke WTO rules. But this could prompt the U.S. to withdraw from the WTO and without the U.S., the authority and effectiveness of the WTO would be greatly diminished. [Extracted from the article]

Zhu Fenglian, the new spokesperson for the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office, made her first public appearance at a press conference on November 27. The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge, the longest sea bridge in the world connecting Hong Kong, Macao and Zhuhai in Guangdong Province in south China to accelerate regional integration and development, has been in operation for over a year. The bridge has also expanded the market for Macao's tourism and conference and exhibition industry, which will help diversify its economy. [Extracted from the article]

Like Jin, many consumers' enthusiasm for the 11/11 activities this year remained vibrant as the consumer festival entered its second decade. From a sales promotion campaign of Alibaba to a nationwide shopping festival, the 11/11 bonanza has enabled consumers to enjoy discounts and brought great profits to e-commerce platforms and online stores. Frequent shopping festivals are losing consumer appeal, he said, adding that the dazzling sales figures do not necessarily translate into strong purchasing power since some people may turn to a frugal lifestyle after the shopping spree. [Extracted from the article]

According to Qu, she is used to buying on credit to meet her own demands through Huabei, a credit payment service of Alipay, an online payment platform of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group. According to a survey conducted by the People's Bank of China (PBC), the central bank, Chinese consumers' preference for delayed consumption has declined. Credit payment services have indeed improved the life of people like Qu who cannot afford certain products in the short term, while some outlandish consumers have gone too far. [Extracted from the article]

Reform, opening up and consumption will be China's major tools to help keep the economy growing steadily durthe second half of the year and beyond, with the country's policymakers unveiling a general roadmap to help navigate through economic headwinds. China's central bank has raised its relending quota by 50 billion yuan ($7.3 billion) to boost financial support for small and micro firms and private businesses. The statement also noted that China will adhere to the principle of "housing is for living, not for speculation", reflecting the determination to ensure the stable development of the real estate market in the long term. [Extracted from the article]