Showing 41 - 50 of 66
Alibaba's counterfeit woes continue
News, Adam Minter, Published on 05/01/2017
» It's hardly a happy new year for Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. Just before Christmas, the US Trade Representative added Alibaba's Taobao e-commerce site to a list of "notorious markets" that traffic in counterfeits. That's an unseemly place for a publicly held company: Other members include a Chinese shopping mall that specialises in counterfeit leather goods and a Paraguayan border market rife with organised crime that hawks everything from fake Ray-Bans to knockoff DVDs.
As test scores slip, China must rethink its schools
News, Adam Minter, Published on 21/12/2016
» It had become something of a ritual. Every three years, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development would release the results of its PISA exams, which are given to hundreds of thousands of students in dozens of countries. And every three years, an American freak-out would ensue, as Chinese students seemed to be outperforming their US counterparts by a wide margin.
China's disappearing fish suggest a bigger problem
News, Adam Minter, Published on 02/12/2016
» It sounds like something out of a dystopian novel: The fresh fish in many of Beijing's biggest supermarkets simply disappeared last week, as if summoned to another realm. Social media buzzed with alarm and paranoia. The Beijing News placed a photo of an empty aquarium and an underemployed fishmonger on its front page.
iPhones should be made in China
News, Adam Minter, Published on 25/11/2016
» Few people took Donald Trump seriously when he said in March that he'd "get Apple to start making their computers and their iPhones on our land, not in China". But his election appears to have caused a change of heart. Apple has reportedly asked the two Asian companies that assemble the bulk of its iPhones to assess whether they can bring the work to the US. One of them, Foxconn, has agreed to look into the matter.
Leaders don't grasp Hong Kong fury
News, Adam Minter, Published on 09/11/2016
» Nobody would ever mistake the Chinese Communist Party for a fleet-footed, democratic organisation responsive to public opinion. But over the decades it's shown a capacity to recognise when political winds are shifting and has been willing to accept outside advice and solutions. That's changing under President Xi Jinping. China's leadership has grown increasingly isolated and distant from citizens, calling into question whether it can truly identify with the needs of a young and dynamic population.
Can Jack Ma spur global job rise?
News, Adam Minter, Published on 19/10/2016
» Alibaba's Jack Ma has big dreams. Having transformed Chinese retail, he's now determined to reinvigorate globalisation.
Trump is right about America's 'third world' airports
News, Adam Minter, Published on 07/10/2016
» It's the one opinion that Donald Trump and his opponents seem to share: America's airports are so bad, it's like "they're from a third world country", as Mr Trump said in the first debate. Vice President Joe Biden said the same of New York's LaGuardia two years ago. Much of the flying public seems to roughly agree.
Beijing wants GMOs but the Chinese people don't
News, Adam Minter, Published on 29/09/2016
» The latest food safety scandal in China might be its most damaging. Earlier this week, a former doctoral student at one of the country's national testing centres for genetically modified organisms went public with allegations of scientific fraud, including claims that records were doctored extensively, that unqualified personnel were employed under illegal contracts and -- most seriously -- that authorities refused to take action when his concerns were aired privately.
Is the age of Asian sweatshops coming to an end?
News, Adam Minter, Published on 07/09/2016
» For 30 years, the word "sweatshop" has conjured up a very specific image: low-wage Asian workers making branded clothes in crowded, unsafe factories for consumers overseas. The power of that image has launched human rights campaigns, altered how major companies source their products and informed (often incorrectly) how politicians in rich countries shape their trade policies.
A city of 50 million? And China wants three of them
News, Adam Minter, Published on 30/08/2016
» By any measure, Shanghai is one of the world's biggest cities. It's home to more than 24 million people. Its subway system is the longest ever built, extending to its rural limits. Crowds are so thick that burly "shovers" get paid to help pack the trains. Now the local government is saying enough is enough: documents released this week reveal that Shanghai intends to admit a mere 800,000 new residents over the next 24 years, on its way to becoming an "excellent global city".