News in review

Monday____Jan 9

McDonald's sells most of its business in China

Another 1,500 McDonald's are set to open across the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong in five years under the largest franchise deal outside the US between the fast-food giant and a consortium led by CITIC and Carlyle Group.

McDonald's announced on Monday that the Beijing-based conglomerate had won the franchise bid to run its China operations for the next 20 years.

The $2.08 billion deal will give state-owned CITIC and CITIC Capital a controlling stake of 52 percent in the new entity, with US buyout firm Carlyle holding 28 percent and McDonald's 20 percent of shares, according to McDonald's CEO in China, Phyllis Cheung.

With this transaction, McDonald is re-franchising all of its 2,600-plus stores in the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong, a major step toward turning around its fortunes in Asia and cutting costs globally. (Photo 1)

Blue sky in Beijing after a week of smog

Beijing residents saw blue skies on Sunday, as a cold front dispersed smog that had been hovering over the capital for the past week. Having been cooped up indoors for a week, many people took to streets and parks for the first time this year.

Blue skies are forecast for the next few days.

Cai Qi, deputy Party chief and acting mayor of Beijing, has promised to take tougher measures to improve the city's air quality in 2017.

"Open-air barbecues, garbage incineration, biomass burning and road dust, for example, are acts of noncompliance with regulations, and the result of lax supervision and weak law enforcement," he said, adding that the city will launch an environmental police force to address the issues in its 16 districts. (Photo 2)

Tuesday____Jan 10

Rules adopted to keep anti-graft teams honest

The country's 500,000-plus corruption investigators are being placed under stricter supervision as a regulation to standardize graft probes was adopted.

Experts said the regulation, passed at the annual plenary meeting of the top anti-corruption watchdog - the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China - can help ensure an unsullied disciplinary team, after some corrupt investigators were exposed.

The regulation sets clear standards on how to handle corruption tips, how to check and review cases and how to manage ill-gotten money and assets, according to a report published on the commission's website on Sunday.

China launched a massive anti-corruption and austerity campaign as the top Party leadership was elected in late 2012.

Mandatory pet quarantine may be cut

China could be about to scrap its mandatory quarantine period for "low risk" pets entering the country, a top government agency has revealed.

Cats and dogs from overseas must spend at least seven days at an inspection facility to undergo extensive tests for rabies and other conditions that could cause an epidemic.

However, animals deemed low risk could in future be released after passing a simple test at the port of entry, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine has told China Daily. It means instead of waiting a week, owners could be reunited with their pets within an hour of arrival.

According to the administration, about 8,000 pets - only cats and dogs are allowed to be carried into China as pets - were brought in between January and November. (Photo 3)

Wednesday____Jan 11

China finally makes a ballpoint pen tip

It has eluded China for five years, but finally the country has developed it: the tip of ballpoint pens.

Making them requires high-precision machinery and very hard, ultra-thin steel plates. Special microelements must be added to liquid steel to make a quality tip that can write continually for at least 800 meters (2,624 feet), but the formula had long been kept a trade secret by foreign manufacturers, leaving imports the only option for Chinese pen makers.

Without that ability, China's penmakers who produce 38 billion ballpoint pens have had to import the crucial component from abroad, costing the industry a reported $17.3 million a year.

Now state-owned Taiyuan Iron and Steel Co said it has mastered the production of steel components for pen tips after trying for five years. (Photo 4)

Major tourist city to appoint 'toilet chiefs'

The northwestern Chinese city of Xi'an, one of the most popular tourist destinations in the country, is to appoint "toilet chiefs" this year, the city tourism bureau said.

The city aims to make all public toilets and those in restaurants and entertainment venues meet national standards in terms of sufficient numbers, and cleanliness. All public toilets should also be free of charge.

The condition of toilets will be included in the assessment of tourist attractions and restaurants.

China is in the midst of a three-year "toilet revolution," building 33,500 new toilets and renovating 25,000 by the end of the year, according to the National Tourism Administration.

Thursday____Jan 12

Spring Festival to see nearly 3 billion trips

The world's largest annual human migration, the Spring Festival travel rush, will be even larger this year.

People will make a total of 2.98 billion trips nationwide during the annual travel peak, from Friday to Feb 21, up 2.2 percent year-on-year, according to an official forecast.

Twelve percent of trips will be made by railway, 84.6 percent by road, 1.4 percent by water and 2 percent by air, according to a report by the National Intelligent Transport Systems Center of Engineering and Technology in China, the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Transport.

The total volume of passengers taking trains and airplanes will increase by about 10 percent year-on-year, the report said.

The expected peaks are on Jan 25, three days before Lunar New Year's Day, and on Feb 2, the final day of the national holiday period.

Digital economy may create more than 400m jobs

China's digital economy is predicted to create more than 400 million jobs by 2035, a new report has said.

Internet-based economy could be worth $16 trillion by then, according to a Boston Consulting Group report, released at a new economy summit sponsored by Alibaba Group.

Alibaba, China's biggest online trader, is expected to generate over 100 million of those jobs, according to the report, with 30 million created since 2003.

As jobs are created, digital technology like cloud computing and artificial intelligence will replace more and more manpower, the report said.

Meanwhile, 20 percent of the world's population will become self-employed or freelance via the internet in the next decade, Alibaba Vice-President Gao Hongbing said at the summit. The digital economy will surpass the manufacturing sector in scale and account for a quarter of the world's economy, Gao said.

Friday____Jan 13

China, Trump representative may meet at Davos

The Chinese delegation attending next week's World Economic Forum annual meeting at Davos, Switzerland, might meet on the sidelines with the transition team of US president-elect Donald Trump.

President Xi Jinping will lead the Chinese delegation to Switzerland for a state visit from Sunday to Wednesday. On Tuesday, he will become the first top Chinese leader to attend the Davos meeting.

"Someone from the transition team representing the new administration" will attend the forum, Klaus Schwab, forum executive chairman, said. It was not known who that would be.

Asked whether a Trump representative would meet with the Chinese delegation at Davos, Vice-Foreign Minister Li Baodong said that Beijing is willing to arrange meetings with various parties if time permits on the sidelines of the Davos forum, so "the relevant two-way meetings are being discussed", Li said, without directly confirming a meeting with the Trump team.

Qing Dynasty vase sold for high price at auction

A vase decorated with blooming flowers sold for $3.24 million (22.425 million yuan) at a Beijing auction. The vase, from the Emperor Qianlong period (1711-1799) in the Qing Dynasty (1644 -1911), was stolen and taken to the UK in 1860, and had appeared at auctions many times.

The piece, from the Guang Tang Bi Que auction house, was made using a Western porcelain making technique. It was part of a former collection at the UK's Fonthill House.

"The piece is a major porcelain from the middle and late Qianlong period", Qian Weipeng, a porcelain authentication expert, said.

(China Daily USA 01/13/2017 page12)