China joins Arctic 'coldrush club'

15 May 2013 Last updated at 11:00 GMT By Matt McGrath Environment correspondent, BBC News Environmental changes all across the Arctic are driving up global interest in the region China is one of a number of countries that has gained permanent observer status on the Arctic Council.

At a meeting in Sweden, the eight members of the Council accepted India, Italy, Japan, South Korea and Singapore.

However following dissent from Canada, a decision on the EU's application has been deferred.

The permanent observers have no decision making powers.

The opening up of the Arctic to shipping and oil and gas exploitation has fuelled worldwide interest in the region.

Continue reading the main story

As ministers said, what happens in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic, so it's a good step to make the Arctic Council open to new voices”

End Quote Ruth Davis Greenpeace With a changing climate allowing ships to travel more cheaply and quickly across the Northern route, Asian countries with ship building industries are particularly interested in closer links to the region and the Council.

Talking shop

The Arctic Council was set up in the 1990s and has been mainly concerned with environmental matters including climate change and pollution, both of which are being felt more heavily in the Northern regions.

It has eight permanent members made up of the five coastal Arctic countries, Norway, Russia, Canada, US and Denmark - it also includes three other non coastal members, Finland, Iceland and Sweden.

It has limited powers, issuing non binding protocols on member states - but as the ice recedes and the wider exploitation of the region becomes possible, the rest of world has taken notice and wants to be involved.

Already six European countries are permanent observers. Now the Council has accepted some of the world's most important emerging powers into what has been dubbed the "coldrush club", a name that reflects the opportunities many see for the exploitation of oil and gas resources in the region.

Up to 13 percent of the world's undiscovered oil reserves, and 30 percent of undiscovered gas deposits are said to lie above the Arctic Circle.

The new observers will have no voting rights and must also confirm they will not challenge the ownership of the five Arctic coastal states.

The meeting in Kiruna, Sweden also agreed on a new manual that will govern the activities and roles of the observers. They will not be able to directly raise issues but will have to bring them forward through one of the eight core members.

But the Council was unable to agree on the application from the European Union. It is believed that Canada, which has now assumed the chairmanship of the Council was strongly opposed to the EU getting a permanent observer seat.

The oil and gas potential of the region is huge with almost a third of the world's undiscovered gas deposits

There have been ongoing disputes between the two over an EU ban on seal fur and other products. The EU is also poised to restrict imports of oil produced in the Alberta tar sands.

The Council said that the application of the EU for observer status was received affirmatively, but it deferred a final decision until the concerns of members are resolved. It is believed that negotiations are now ongoing over the seal fur issue between the Council and the European Commission.

The influx of new permanent observers has been cautiously welcomed by environmental campaigners.

"There are lots of things going on up here that are genuinely of legitimate concern to the rest of the world," Ruth Davis from Greenpeace told BBC News.

"As ministers said what happens in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic, so it's a good step to make the Arctic Council open to new voices. But really the question is are the voices of those who are on the receiving end of rapid environmental change in the Arctic, are they being heard in the council?"

Spill plans

The growing interest of countries like China and India in joining the Arctic Council reflects the changing nature of the body say observers. Another decision that reflects the beefing up of the Council's activities was the acceptance of an oil spill preparation plan.

According to the Council this legally-binding agreement will substantially improve procedures for dealing with oil leaks in the Arctic.

Speaking during the meeting, US Secretary of State John Kerry welcomed the idea.

"As the US was reminded painfully in the Gulf of Mexico, we need strong partnerships and shared operational guidelines before a disaster occurs - We need to prevent disasters happening in the first place," he said.

Leiv Lunde is the director of the and a former special envoy on energy and climate change at the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He says that the role of Council in the world is growing significantly.

"The Arctic Council has until now been an organisation for the environmental sectors of government - but you are moving into an area where there are bound to be tradeoffs and big fights about what will going to happen," he said.

"We are going from symbolic postures to real politics and that's a different game."

The Council meeting also published a new scientific report from the Stockholm Environment Institute on the resilience of the Arctic. It suggests that rapid and even abrupt changes are occurring on multiple fronts across the region, raising the risk of crossing thresholds that would cause irreversible changes.

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Can China become a hi-tech economy?

22 May 2013 Last updated at 00:52 GMT By John Sudworth BBC News, Shanghai The BBC's John Sudworth talks to the director of the world's biggest genome mapping company

Inside a former shoe factory in China's southern city of Shenzhen, the noise of hammering and stitching has long gone.

In its place is something much quieter - the hum of laboratory machinery and the click of computer keyboards.

But listen extra carefully and you might just pick up another sound: the deep, seismic creaking of the world's second-largest economy moving forward.

At least, that is what this country's economic planners would like to hope.

BGI has grown from nothing a little more than a decade ago to become the world's biggest genetic sequencing company.

Almost 3,000 people work at the plant in Shenzhen, decoding DNA data on behalf of global clients in healthcare and agriculture.

Gone are the low-skill, low-wage shoemakers. In their place high-skilled, hi-tech brainpower.

BGI has just decoded all of the varieties of the chickpea and is now attempting to determine the genetic components of human intelligence, to give just two examples of the sort of work being done here.

"You have to have more young people, crazy people, who can work day and night to figure out what the data represents," one of the company founders, Wang Jian, said.

"We have thousands of people working in this field, so lots of countries ask us for help. We charge them a reasonable fee and we get the money to feed ourselves."

The company, which came into being as part of the international collaboration to map the human genome, has quickly made use of one key resource: China's abundant supply of cheap graduates.

In some ways, genome sequencing - producing the complete DNA sequence of a particular organism - is the easy bit. You need some very expensive sequencing machines and a lot of computing power.

The hard bit though is decoding or mapping the genome.

For that, you need a lot of careful analysis, looking for similar patterns and sequences in the long strings of letters, so that you can then identify the parts of the genome responsible for particular biological functions.

And that is where the cheap graduates come in.

'More creative' Continue reading the main story

We need a more challenging, more creative education system - otherwise we still, for most Chinese companies, are followers - following the UK and the States to try to catch up”

End Quote Wang Jian Chinese scientist The floors of the old shoe factory are now divided into hundreds of small cubicles, and inside each one sits a technician at a computer terminal, poring over data from the labs.

BGI can do this kind of work on a bigger scale than anyone else because elsewhere in the world, it would cost much more to hire all this brainpower.

So China now finds itself at the forefront of the important effort to find genetic components to things like autism and obesity, both projects that BGI is working on, for international clients.

The country currently has a glut of unemployed graduates - part of the reason, of course, that they are cheap to employ.

Could BGI therefore offer a glimpse of the next stage of China's remarkable economic transformation, with more companies drawing on this army of educated workers to become world leaders?

Before those aforementioned economic planners get too carried away and toast the arrival of the future, BGI's founder has a warning for them.

"Our education system has to be changed fast," Mr Wang said.

"We need a more challenging, more creative education system. Otherwise we still, for most Chinese companies, are followers - following the UK and the States to try to catch up."

'Own way'

In fact, so unhappy was BGI with the quality of the Chinese education system that it set up its own college, in the hope of replacing the traditional learning methods with more creativity and innovation.

China has many low-skilled, low-wage workers

But the college has not been allowed to award its own diplomas and now Mr Wang is appealing directly to the government.

"Give people more chance to build up their own schools. We don't want to change the whole system, but give us a chance to try our own way."

"That's what I need to go through you to say. Please do not cut this," he added.

Some outsiders have suggested that, rather than a break with the past, BGI is simply following a tried and tested model.

A bit like China's giant computer assembly plants, only this time producing DNA sequences rather than gadgets.

The trick is the same; do the job just as well but cheaper than it can be done elsewhere.

Mr Wang's concern is for the next phase, for BGI to move beyond data processing and analysis to become a real innovator and leader in biotechnology.

He is certainly not the first person to criticise China's education system as not being fit for that purpose.

The rote learning and cramming approach has long been identified as producing students who are better at studying than they are at learning.

But as one of China's most successful scientists, his is a powerful voice.

And in the story of his company, the country's economic planners may find not so much a model of China's future, but more a warning about how far off that future still is.

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What does Xi Jinping's China Dream mean?

5 June 2013 Last updated at 23:40 GMT Xi Jinping wants his citizens to aim high - but at what? China and the US are global rivals - yet when it comes to inspirational appeal, China has no match for the American Dream. But that may be changing, as Beijing promotes Xi Jinping's new slogan - the China Dream. The BBC's Martin Patience asks what it means.

In recent months Chinese state media have unleashed a propaganda blitz extolling the virtues of President Xi Jinping's China Dream.

It has rarely been out of the newspapers. So-called "dream walls" have appeared in some schools and universities where students are encouraged to write their own dreams on the wall.

A leading think-tank - the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences - has also called for proposals to research the dream. And the slogan has even inspired a chart-topping folk song.

In the arcane world of Chinese politics, slogans matter. They are the words that are meant to convey a leader's vision for the country.

And when you compare Mr Xi's China Dream with some of his predecessors' slogans - Scientific Development or the Three Representatives, for example - it certainly comes across as more catchy.

'Rejuvenation'

But what does the China Dream actually mean? Mr Xi made his first reference to it in November 2012, when he was promoted to the top Communist Party post.

The propaganda storm began in earnest after he became president in 2013. He used the term numerous times in his first address to the nation as head of state on 17 March.

"We must make persistent efforts, press ahead with indomitable will, continue to push forward the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and strive to achieve the Chinese dream of great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation," he said.

Mr Xi has not specified how to put the dream into practice

"To realise the Chinese road, we must spread the Chinese spirit, which combines the spirit of the nation with patriotism as the core and the spirit of the time with reform and innovation as the core," he went on.

But Mr Xi has been short on specifics and on how to put the dream into practice.

Liu Mingfu, a retired Chinese colonel, believes he has a better idea than most. He published a book called the China Dream: Great Power Thinking and Strategic Posture in the Post-America Era in 2010.

Ever since Mr Xi started using the slogan, Mr Liu's books have been flying off the shelves. He would not say how many books he had sold, but it was clear from the smile on his face that he was doing rather well.

The author believes that China's new leader shares his dream - which is to make China the world's dominant power.

"Since the 19th Century, China has been lagging on the world stage," he said. "President Xi's dream is of a stronger nation with a strong military."

And the symbolism of the surroundings where Mr Xi apparently first used the slogan was hard to ignore. He used the National Museum's Road to Revival exhibition to deliver his message to senior leaders.

The exhibit expounds on China's suffering at the hands of colonial powers in the 19th and 20th Centuries and the subsequent restoration of its greatness under Communist Party rule.

Last year, China launched its first aircraft carrier - a symbol of its intent. But the country's growing military might is making its neighbours nervous. China is also currently embroiled in several territorial disputes in the region.

Broad appeal

But perhaps the appeal of the China Dream is that it is so loosely defined that it can mean almost anything.

For one student, the China Dream "is perhaps studying hard"

At Xi Jinping's alma mater, the prestigious Tsinghua University in Beijing, that was certainly the impression.

"For students, the China Dream is perhaps studying hard," said one science student.

"But I think the core of the dream is the same: We Chinese must do something for the country. I want to be a professor in the future. I want to make a contribution to the education sector."

Others are not so optimistic about the China Dream. They see it as a propaganda campaign by the ruling Communist Party to win public affection. It certainly comes as problems mount for China's leaders.

The economy is slowing and more university graduates are now struggling to find jobs. There is also growing anger over official corruption and pollution.

And though the China Dream has not been clearly defined, those in power appear to know what it does not include. Earlier this year, there were rare protests at one of China's most influential newspapers after the authorities censored their front page editorial on the China Dream - which called for the rule of law.

One of the country's best known authors and bloggers, Li Chengpeng, says the problem with the China Dream is that it does not address key issues.

"We cannot mention universal values or an independent judiciary," he said. "We cannot talk about multi-party democracy. What we need is not a magical dream but good politicians."

It gives you some ideas of the pressures facing the party. Using nationalism is of course a powerful unifying force. But the China Dream may be a sign that Mr Xi fears difficult times ahead.

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China hosts Netanyahu and Abbas

6 May 2013 Last updated at 08:56 GMT Mr Abbas said the visits would allow China to listen to both sides Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are in China for separate talks with top officials.

Mr Abbas, who met President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Monday, said he would explain obstacles to talks with Israel.

Mr Netanyahu, who is visiting Shanghai before flying to Beijing later this week, was due to sign trade deals and discuss the issue of Iran.

The two men are not expected to meet while they are in China.

China would assist if they wanted to, a foreign ministry official said, but the two leaders were not expected to be in the same city at the same time.

Mr Abbas, who arrived in Beijing on Sunday, signed agreements on technical co-operation and cultural exchange with Mr Xi on Monday. The Palestinian leader was also expected to meet Premier Li Keqiang during his visit.

Speaking to Xinhua news agency ahead of the visit, he said he would update Chinese leaders on "what are the obstacles that block" dialogue with Israel, and would ask Beijing "to use its relationship with Israel to remove the obstacles that obstruct the Palestinian economy".

Xinhua quoted him as saying: "It is very good that Netanyahu will visit China too because it is a good opportunity that the Chinese listen to both of us."

Mr Netanyahu's visit is the first to China by an Israeli leader in six years.

He was expected to meet business delegates in Shanghai before heading to Beijing. Israeli officials say he is expected to sign a number of trade deals.

He is also expected to raise the issue of Iran, which many nations including Israel believe is trying to build nuclear weapons - something Iran denies.

Beijing is one of the biggest buyers of Iranian oil, and has opposed unilateral Western sanctions on Tehran.

"China and Israel have both much to gain from enhanced co-operation, and that's our goal," Mr Netanyahu's spokesman Mark Regev told AFP news agency.

Mr Netanyahu's departure was delayed by a security cabinet meeting to discuss developments in Syria, after two Israeli air strikes on sites in Syria over the weekend.

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Amazon beats Google with China apps

6 May 2013 Last updated at 11:31 GMT The Chinese market has many home-grown stores offering paid apps Amazon has become the first Western technology firm to offer paid-for Android apps in China - beating Google to the lucrative market.

Google's Chinese store for its mobile operating system - the most popular globally - only offers free apps.

Amazon's move paves the way for it to launch its Kindle e-reader devices in the country, analysts predict.

Other locally-based services already offer paid apps to China which is the world's largest mobile phone market.

But many of the home-grown services face issues with malicious software contained within apps, some of which are pirated versions.

In contrast, the Amazon store, which launched over the weekend, promises "quality and safety testing".

Massive market

As well as curating existing apps, Amazon said it will work with local developers to create programs specifically for local users.

The move is part of Amazon's strategy to dig deeper into the Chinese mobile phone market.

Compared to its dominant position in other countries such as the US and UK, Amazon controlled less than 3% of China's massive 169bn yuan (£17.6bn) business-to-consumer e-commerce market in the fourth quarter last year.

Amazon launched its paid-for apps over the weekend

In December last year, the retailer launched its Kindle web store, but is yet to sell the actual e-reader devices.

However, China, like many countries in the region, has a thriving market in counterfeit electronics - meaning many consumers are already likely familiar with Amazon's product.

Apple apology

Key competitor Apple already has a significant presence in the country.

China is currently Apple's second-largest market, with more than 17,000 outlets selling its products.

The company says it has eight stores in mainland China, with another three in Greater China, which includes Hong Kong.

However, Apple's reputation among Chinese consumers has taken a hit recently after chief executive Tim Cook was forced to apologise to customers over "misunderstandings" surrounding its repair policies.

"We are aware that a lack of communications... led to the perception Apple's attitude was arrogant and that we do not care and attach importance to consumer feedback," Mr Cook wrote.

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