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In mid-December 2022, after China started to ease COVID-19 restrictions that had lasted for three years, the world keenly anticipated a swift and robust recovery in China's economy in 2023. But at a tone-setting economic conference, top Chinese policymakers, while stressing that "an overall recovery and improvement is expected," also offered a sobering assessment of the difficulties that lay ahead.

"Economic work in 2023 will be complex," Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, concluded in a speech at the Central Economic Work Conference (CEWC) on December 15, 2022. The meeting, aimed at setting priorities for economic work in 2023, demanded making economic stability a top priority and pursuing steady progress while ensuring economic stability.

As 2023 draws to an end, what transpired in the Chinese economy over the last year is consistent with that assessment. The economy faced serious downward pressure from shrinking demand, supply shocks, and weakening expectations - "triple pressures" as officials put it. But it also mounted an impressive recovery, with the GDP growth rate widely expected to meet or even exceed an initial target of around 5 percent, a remarkable improvement from the previous three years during the pandemic. More crucially, China also achieved solid progress in high-quality development, with the rise of domestic consumption, scientific and technological innovation, and green development.

All told, China's recovery has become one of the biggest highlights for the global economy in 2023 amid a severe downturn and a complex geo-economic situation - China is expected to be the fastest-growing major economy and contribute roughly one-third of global growth, according to Chinese and foreign economists. Beyond the direct contribution to growth, faster growth in China also has positive spillover effects on the rest of the world: A single percentage point of growth in China, on average, increases output in other economies by 0.3 percent over the medium term, according to the IMF.

Behind such a hard-won, impressive outcome are objective and scientific decision-making by Chinese policymakers under Xi's leadership, a series of targeted and effective policies to tackle risks and challenges head-on, as well as the effective execution of those policies - the quintessential Chinese governance model that underpins China's long-running economic miracle, economists said.

This also vividly demonstrated how Xi Jinping's economic thought, which, among other things, stresses high-quality development, is put into practice to address problems and promote high-quality development, they noted.

Hard-won, impressive outcome
China's economic recovery was by no means smooth in 2023.

"In fact, the post-pandemic economic recovery was full of difficulties and challenges. Some were unprecedented. Despite all these [challenges], China took a series of measures and deepened reforms and opening-up. We achieved an effective improvement in quality and reasonable growth in quantity," Guan Tao, global chief economist at BOC International under the Bank of China, told the Global Times. "This indeed is a very hard-won outcome."

China's economy grew by 5.2 percent year-on-year in the first three quarters, and the full-year GDP growth rate is expected to exceed the official growth target of around 5 percent. That is a remarkable comeback from a 3 percent rate in 2022 and significantly higher than the average growth rate of 4.5 percent between 2020 and 2022. Globally, a 5-percent growth rate in China would also largely outpace a projected global growth rate of 3 percent, 1.5 percent in advanced economies, and 4 percent in emerging markets and developing economies, according to the IMF.

What's more, international organizations have constantly upgraded China's growth forecasts, in stark contrast to grim predictions hyped by some Western economic pundits and media outlets.

"We recently upgraded our 2023 forecast to 5.4 percent. This forecast was increased by 0.4 percentage points in November," Steven Alan Barnett, senior IMF resident representative in China, told the Global Times in an exclusive interview. "At 5.4 percent growth, China by itself would explain around one-third of global growth in 2023."

Apart from growth in quantity, China's high-quality development also made significant strides in 2023, reflected in the rapid rise of new emerging industries, breakthroughs in critical technologies, the transition toward consumption-led growth, and the expansion of green development.

High-quality development
Barnett highlighted China's rapid growth in new industries like electric vehicles (EVs) and green technologies that offered a cushion against other downward pressures. "China, in fact, stands out as a technological leader in the production of green technologies such as solar panels and EVs," he said.

In a remarkable example, China surpassed Japan to become the world's biggest auto exporter in the first quarter of 2023, thanks to the new-energy vehicles (NEVs) sector. In the first 11 months, NEVs output grew by 34.5 percent to 8.426 million units, while sales increased by 36.7 percent to 8.304 million units, according to the latest industry data. More than 64 percent of global NEVs sales were in China during the period, according to the 2023 World New Energy Vehicle Congress.

Also highlighting progress in China's innovation-driven high-quality development, in November, the added value of high-tech manufacturing above designated size increased by 6.2 percent year-on-year, 4.4 percentage points faster than that of the previous month. High-tech products such as solar cells, service robots, and integrated circuits continued their stellar performance, with their output rising 44.5 percent, 33.3 percent, and 27.9 percent, respectively.

That helped promote high-quality development in China's foreign trade, with the upgrade of the export structure. In the first 11 months, China's exports of NEVs, lithium batteries, and solar cells - collectively known as "the three new items" of China's exports - jumped by 41.7 percent to about 79.9 billion yuan.

Also underscoring China's optimizing trade structure, "during a period of declining orders from the US and Europe, China's trade with emerging markets continues to grow," Wei Jianguo, former Chinese vice minister of commerce and executive deputy director of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, told the Global Times.

Another highlight of China's high-quality development is the rise of domestic consumption as the main economic growth driver. In the first 11 months, total retail sales, a main gauge of consumption, grew by 7.2 percent year-on-year to about 42.8 trillion yuan, with a 10.1 percent growth in November. "Consumption explained around 80 percent of growth in the first three quarters of the year," Barnett said.

Innovation-led and consumption-driven growth is a crucial part of China's high-quality development, which is at the front and center of China's economic policymaking. This year's CEWC, held on December 11 and 12, stressed that it is imperative to uphold high-quality development as the unyielding principle of the new era. The phrase has drawn much attention as it resembles the popular Chinese saying "development is the absolute principle," popularized during the decades of reform and opening-up that ushered in China's rapid economic rise.

Decisive top-down leadership

How did China overcome difficulties and challenges and achieve these hard-won gains? Decisive top-down leadership is the key, economists said.

Over the last year, at major meetings and inspection tours across the country, Xi has repeatedly called for efforts to tackle challenges, stabilize growth, and promote high-quality development.

In his speech at the CEWC last year, Xi stressed "We need to bear in mind the overall strategic picture and focus on major problems" and offered clear guidance on how to tackle them. He called for efforts to expand domestic demand, build a modern industrial system, develop the public sector and support the non-public sector, attract and utilize foreign investment, and forestall and defuse risks in areas such as real estate, financial market and local government debt.

This guidance has since turned into policy actions over the last year. Overall, China has adopted proactive fiscal and prudent monetary policies that have supported economic recovery. In the budget adopted in March, consumption, technological innovation, and high-quality development were prioritized.

Throughout the year, Chinese officials both at the central and local levels released an array of policy measures to support consumption, investment, and the private sector.

China also welcomed a long stream of global business executives and hosted many high-level trade fairs to boost cooperation.

Then in July, amid new challenges and weakening expectations, Xi presided over a meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC, to set priorities for economic work in the second half of the year. While noting "new difficulties and challenges," the meeting called for solid efforts to expand domestic demand, shore up confidence, and prevent risks. That also led to strong policy measures in the second half of the year, including a plan to issue an additional 1 trillion yuan in treasury bonds in the fourth quarter.

The meeting also stressed that China's economic recovery was a "wave-like" and "zigzag" process. That demonstrated top officials' confidence in the economy, as they are trying to convey a message that China's economy may face high waves but it will always break through and it may zigzag but it will always move forward.

This is very typical of Chinese policymaking - confident in China's development, responsive to new situations, and swift and effective in responding to them, economists said.

"[Top officials] grasp issues in a very objective manner and take measures in a very swift and targeted manner," Guan said.

This has not only helped underpin China's stable economic recovery in 2023 but has also boosted confidence in China's 2024 economic recovery, despite lingering risks and challenges.

"Amid high winds and strong waves in the global economy, China's economy is making solid progress toward the future, forming synergy through optimization and balance, continuously releasing strong development momentum, and demonstrates bright prospects," Cheng Shi, chief economist of ICBC International, told the Global Times.

This year's CEWC, which sets the economic agenda for 2024, noted that some difficulties and challenges must be tackled to achieve further economic recovery and pledged a series of policy measures in a wide range of areas.

"The favorable conditions for China's development outweigh the unfavorable ones, and the overall trend of economic recovery and long-term improvement remains unchanged," it said.

Editor's Note:

As of October 22, over 1.4 million people were displaced and over 6,000 fatalities have been reported amid the latest round of the Israeli-Palestinian armed conflict. Since the establishment of Israel in 1948, warns and armed conflicts have characterized relations between the two sides. Historically, Jews and Arabs, who created concurrent Jewish and Arab civilizations respectively have, until the 20th century, coexisted peacefully before the emergence of seemingly irreconcilable differences.

The Global Times will publish a series of in-depth reports on the "Past and Present of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," exploring the historical, religious, and cultural clashes, delving into the various wars and internal struggles between Israelis and Palestinians, and analyzing the power struggles triggered by external influences from Europe and the US, in an attempt to clarify how the past has influenced the present Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

One land, two names

"We will not leave, we will not leave, we will not leave, and we will remain on our land," Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Saturday when addressing the Cairo Peace Summit. He warned of any attempts to displace people from the war-torn Gaza Strip, and attempts to displace Palestinians from their homes, media sources reported. Following the outbreak of this round of conflict, Israel demanded that approximately 1.1 million residents in the northern Gaza evacuate to the south to facilitate military operations to eliminate the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas).

"The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a deep struggle, intertwined with historical and religious narratives that have shaped its course for generations," read a Fox News article on October 12.

"Central to this conflict is the land of historical and religious significance to both Jewish and Palestinian communities. The Bible plays a pivotal role, with its promise of the land of Canaan to the descendants of Abraham. For Jewish people, this territory represents the biblical Promised Land, where their forebears settled following their exodus from Egypt … From a Palestinian perspective, their connection to the land is also rooted in biblical heritage, tracing their origins back to the ancient Canaanites and Philistines," read the Fox News article.

Canaan, the ancient name for Palestine, lies at the intersection of three continents: Asia, Africa, and Europe, including what is now Israel, Jordan, Gaza, and the West Bank. According to Israeli historical books, Semites who migrated from the Arabian Peninsula migrated to the area from about 3000 BC to 2500 BC, and both Semitic Jews and Arabs once lived here.

According to publicly available information, ancient Jews originated in the Mesopotamian plain approximately 4,000 years ago. They later migrated to the eastern coast of the Mediterranean, known as the Crescent, to escape natural disasters. They then migrated again to the eastern part of the Nile Delta in Egypt due to famine. According to Israeli historical books, around the first half of the 13th century BC, Jewish people, who were unwilling to be enslaved, left Egypt under the leadership of Moses and wandered in the Sinai Peninsula desert for more than 40 years before being led into Canaan by Joshua. Similarly, in the late 13th century BC, another large group called the "Sea Peoples" or Philistines entered Canaan and named the land "Philistia," meaning "the land of the Philistines." In the 5th century BC, Greek historians began using the term "Palestine" to refer to this region.

Around 1000 BC, Jewish people established the Kingdom of Israel in Canaan. The second king of the kingdom, King David (1010 BC-970 BC), is also reported to have led the capture of Jebus (Jerusalem). As with the construction of the palace and the temple of Yahweh, Judaism became the state religion. The scope of the Jewish "Promised Land" also changed due to King David's expansion. According to the Bible, the promised land for God's chosen people was roughly the territory that lay between the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean, read a New York Times article. During King David's reign, his kingdom extended from deep within the Sinai Peninsula to the Euphrates River, including large areas of present-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Egypt. This is reflected in the description of the Promised Land in the Five Books of Moses, according to publicly available materials.

According to media reports, records show that in around 931BC, the kingdoms of Israel and Judah (the origin of the term "Jewish") existed in tandem. Around the same time, the Philistines occupied the southern coastal plain of Israel. In around 722 BC, the Kingdom of Israel was conquered by the Neo-Assyrian Empire, and as an ancient geographical term, "Israel" ceased to exist. Over a century and a half later, the Kingdom of Judah was also overthrown, and many of its inhabitants were exiled to Babylon. Subsequently, this land was conquered by ancient Greece and the Roman Empire. In 4 BC, 6 AD, 66 AD, and 132 AD, the local Jewish population staged multiple uprisings against Roman occupation, but they were brutally suppressed. From 70 AD to 132 AD, most Jews were forced to leave Canaan, marking the end of the Jewish people's settlement in the region. In 135 AD, after suppressing the uprising, the Roman Empire abolished the province of Judea and merged it with the province of Syria to eliminate memories associated with the Jewish people.

In the year 637 AD, the Arabs defeated the Eastern Roman Empire army and Palestine was incorporated into the Arab Empire. During the Umayyad dynasty (661 AD to 750 AD), Jerusalem, which was once a holy site for Judaism and Christianity, became one of the three major holy sites of Islam, along with Mecca and Medina. Present-day Jerusalem, with an area of only 126 square kilometers, is home to the Western Wall and the Temple Mount for Jews, the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque for Muslims, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the Via Dolorosa for Christians.

According to an article published on the news website The Conversation, "Israel" and "Palestine" are two names for one land. "Israel" first appears near the end of the 13th century BC within the Egyptian Merneptah Stele, referring apparently to a people (rather than a place) inhabiting what was then "Canaan," read the article.

"Palestina took its name from the coastal territory of the ancient Philistines, enemies of the Israelites (ancestors of the Jews). Subsequent to the Islamic conquest of the Middle East in the seventh century, Arab peoples began to settle in the former 'Palestina.' Apart from about 90 years of Crusader domination, the land fell under Muslim control for just under 1,200 years. Although Jewish habitation never ceased, the population was overwhelmingly Arab," said the article.

Genesis of Zionism

Palestine became a part of the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century. After World War I, the defeated Ottoman Empire, which was allied with Germany, reluctantly handed over the region, including Palestine, to British mandate rule. In the late 19th century, the Zionist movement, particularly among European Jews who feared extinction, began to emigrate in large numbers to the Palestinian-inhabited areas.

Zionism, also known as Jewish nationalism, takes its name from Mount Zion, a small hill outside the Old City of Jerusalem, symbolizing the ancestral homeland of Israel. Despite the industrial revolution and modernization, anti-Semitism and discrimination against Jews in Europe persisted. Increasingly, secular European Jews supported the idea of returning to their own homeland and establishing a Jewish state, even though a large number of Jews at the time did not endorse the idea of national restoration. Followers of Zionism believed that only by establishing a purely Jewish state could the fate of oppression and exile that Jews had endured for nearly two millennia be resolved. However, it cannot be ignored that their desired destination, Palestine, was not an "uninhabited land," and the idea of a purely Jewish state inevitably clashed with the basic rights of the indigenous Arab population. The founders of Zionism attempted to reach an agreement with the Ottoman Empire, which would overrule the existence of Palestine at the time, but were unsuccessful. As a result, they focused their efforts on gaining support from Western powers.

World War I brought a significant turning point to the once stagnant Zionist movement. Chemist Chaim Weizmann, who had made important contributions to the British army during the war, became the leader of the Zionist movement. He united with Jewish elites such as the Rothschilds and gained the support of the British government.

However, although the Ottoman Empire was defeated in the war and the UK began its mandatory colonial rule in Palestine, the British did not promptly fulfill their promise to the Jewish people. Instead, they tightened restrictions on Jewish immigration.

At the same time, Palestine witnessed a wave of immigration of Jewish people facing persecution in Eastern Europe. Prompted by the wave of immigration, the leaders of the Zionist movement considered finding a piece of land in Argentina to be their homeland, and the British government also proposed allocating land from its colony, Uganda for a Jewish settlement. However, due to the special religious and historical significance of Palestine, especially Jerusalem, to the Jewish people, the Zionist movement ultimately insisted that returning to Palestine was the only truly satisfactory outcome for the establishment of a homeland.

Far from this decision bringing a satisfactory outcome, it marked the beginning of suffering. Starting from the late 1920s, Arab nationalists, began to push back against the Zionist movement. They organized armed attacks on Jewish settlements and pressured the British to completely close Jewish immigration channels. As the strategic importance of oil increased, the British turned against Jewish people and supported the Arabs, causing further chaos.

The rise of the Nazi regime in Germany and the outbreak of World War II accelerated the "return" of Jews to Palestine. The brutal fact that 6 million Jews perished in the German Nazi-mandated holocaust during the war quickly changed the mainstream opinion in Europe and America, leading to support for the establishment of Israel. Exhausted and depleted from the war, the UK had no choice but to adjudicate the Palestine issue to the United Nations. In November 1947, UN Resolution 181 on the partition of Palestine was passed, marking the official establishment of an Arab state and a Jewish state in the region. This resolution was met with jubilation by the Jewish people, but the allocation of about 55 percent of the land to Israel and the subsequent opposition from Palestinians and other Arab countries sparked controversy.

Hope for peaceful coexistence

On the second day after Israel declared its independence, the Arab-Israeli War of 1948 broke out. By the end of the war in 1949, Palestinians had lost nearly four-fifths of the territory allocated to them by the United Nations, and over 750,000 people were displaced from their homes. The core issues of territory, refugees, the status of Jerusalem, and Jewish settlements have created significant disagreements between Israelis and Palestinians, becoming obstacles to peace talks.

Today, with the exception of very few countries, the rights and political status of the Jewish people are guaranteed. Against this backdrop, how to promote progress within Israel along the only viable and nonviolent path, and save both Palestinians and Israelis from "imminent catastrophe", are questions that many historians contemplate. Some of them believe that the prolonged turmoil is a result of negligence toward the interests of the Palestinian population during the nation-building process. They argue that Zionism, as an ideological mission for the establishment of Israel, should not supersede the rights of other minority groups in any subsequent system.

Some observers believe that throughout history, the Jewish people have endured great suffering but have also achieved great accomplishments, becoming a driving force in the progress of global civilization. The Palestinian people, on the other hand, have inherited the tragic fate of the Jewish people, who have been without a country, wandering for nearly 2,000 years. Today, Hamas represents the extreme aspirations of the Palestinian people to establish a state on equal footing with Israel. As long as this goal is not achieved, there will be people who will follow the path of Hamas. As China has consistently maintained, the solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict lies in the "two-state solution," which means establishing an independent Palestinian state. Only through this can peaceful coexistence between Palestine and Israel be achieved, and harmony between the Arab and Jewish nations be realized.

Chinese tech company EHang Holdings Limited has begun to sell its self-developed unmanned electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft EH216-S on Chinese e-commerce platform Taobao at a cost of 2.39 million yuan ($332,032) per unit, the Global Times observed on Monday.

He Tianxing, a deputy president of EHang, told the Global Times that it was not only for online sale, but also aimed to inform the public the development potential of low-altitude economy in the future. 

The EH216-S last December obtained the standard Airworthiness Certificate from the Civil Aviation Administration of China, which marked the eVTOL aircraft becoming eligible for commercial operation. 

EH216-S Passenger-Carrying UAV System Obtains Standard Airworthiness Certificate from CAAC and the Certified Aircraft Delivered to Customer in Guangzhou.

Aside from its main selling points including its small size, easy take-off, landing and re-charge ability, as well as quietness, EHang made multiple backups for core parts such as propellers, electric engine, flying control system and batteries.

The Government Work Report released during the recently concluded two sessions earlier this month stated that China will foster new growth engines in fields such as biomanufacturing, commercial spaceflight, and the low-altitude economy.

Analysts pointed out that low-altitude transport can help reduce waste once ground transport has reached its limit in megacities. 

Following the announced policy, many cities have taken measures to develop the sector. As the country's first trial province for low-altitude air space management, Southwest China's Sichuan Province simplified low-altitude flight test applications. East China's Anhui also crafted rules to develop low-altitude economy, stating to accelerate the development of the industry in Hefei and Wuhu, two major cities there. 

In addition, Shenzhen city in South China's Guangdong Province has published a set of documents and government regulations supporting the development of the low-altitude economy in the province, according to Xinhua News Agency. 

As of 2025, the output value of low-altitude economy in China is estimated to reach 3 to 5 trillion yuan, according to a recent survey by the International Digital Economy Academy.

In his first public appearance before media since taking his new post, Wu Qing, head of China's securities watchdog, outlined on Wednesday his plan to ensure the stable development of the capital market, the world's second largest, and vowed to beef up institutional buildup and to better ensure investor protection.

Chinese analysts noted that the institutional and holistic approach outlined by the head of China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), who takes a harsh tone on illegal behavior while being considerate to small investors, is a pragmatic approach that suits the market reality, and is set to boost market confidence, stabilize expectations and shore up the overall investment value of China's capital market.

A number of delegates to the ongoing two sessions also contributed their thoughts on the topic, which is under the global media spotlight and has become a target for Western doomsayers in recent weeks.

Wu's appearance at the press conference, held during the ongoing two sessions, along with several other top government officials in charge of China's economic and trade affairs, is one of the highlights of the political event, as ensuring the stability of the capital market was mentioned in the Government Work Report for the first time following a period of turbulence in the Chinese A-share market ahead of China's Spring Festival holidays in February.

The Government Work Report, delivered by Chinese Premier Li Qiang on Tuesday at the opening meeting of the second session of the 14th National People's Congress, set a growth target of around 5 percent for the country's economy in 2024.

Notably, the report pointed out that "the underlying stability of the capital market should be enhanced."

Giving his insight on how to ensure the stable development of the capital market, Wu the CSRC chairman, who is one day short of completing his first month in the new post, said enhancing institutional buildup and attracting long-term investment into the market will be among the measures to be taken to accomplish the task outlined in the Government Work Report.

Acknowledging that market operation has its own rules and should not be interfered with under normal circumstances, Wu told the press conference that the regulator "won't hesitate to act to correct extreme situations when the market seriously deviates from its fundamentals, irrational and violent fluctuations occur, liquidity is exhausted, market panic occurs and serious draining of confidence appears."

The first-time ever mentioning of enhancing the underlying stability of the capital market sends a strong signal of China's commitment to building itself into a financial powerhouse and sets the tone for the future development in related fields, delegates to the two sessions said.

Outside of the two sessions venue, Chinese scholars also shared their views on what Wu had said at the press conference.

Dong Shaopeng, a senior research fellow at the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China, told the Global Times on Wednesday that the announcement made by CSRC chairman Wu, with an emphasis on both strength and toughness, laid out a clear-cut vision on improving the construction of fundamental institutions and better regulating the capital market, and is a "pragmatic approach in line with reality."

"The dual emphasis by the CSRC on strengthening regulation and bolstering investor protection are set to improve the stability and quality of the Chinese capital market," Dong noted.

Dong said that the emphasis on protecting small and medium-sized investors addresses the root of the problem facing China's capital market, as their ranks formed the ultimate source of long-term funding for the Chinese A-share market.

The stock market has drawn much attention during this year's two sessions, with members, legislators, and officials putting forward practical and broad-perspective suggestions and motions on stabilizing the capital market, Xi Junyang, a professor at the Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, told the Global Times on Wednesday.

Wu's remarks at the press conference will be heard by both domestic and overseas investors, Xi Junyang noted. "And his remarks, including protecting investors' interests, lifting the quality of listed companies, and implementing a stricter delisting system, are conducive to boosting investor confidence and the overall investment value of China's capital market."

"We can expect proactive measures to be announced in these areas," Xi Junyang said.

The Government Work Report set priorities and the direction for this year's economic work, and also offers much-needed reassurance to the capital market, Yang Delong, chief economist at Shenzhen-based First Seafront Fund Management Co, told the Global Times on Wednesday.

"The stock market is a barometer of a country's economy," Yang said. "Stepped-up macro-policies and stable economic recovery will contribute to a rebound in the A-share market."

A note of reassurance

With the sound development of the capital market a matter of vital concern, delegates to the two sessions are also contributing their ideas, with some pointing out that the Government Work Report has brought "a certain sense of reassurance to the market."

"The Chinese equities market was on a turbulent ride at the beginning of 2024, so the statement in the Government Work Report gives investors a sense of encouragement as well as a certain sense of reassurance," Fang Jie, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and president of Hubei University of Economics, told the Global Times on Wednesday.

There is a lot of work to be done to improve the underlying stability of the capital market and ensure its sound development, and first and foremost is to continue shoring up the macroeconomy, which provides a foundation for market performance, noted Fang, who has also served as the deputy secretary general of Wuhan government in Central China's Hubei Province and the director of the Wuhan Financial Work Bureau.

Chinese financial authorities also need to further carry out sweeping market reforms, such as creating more innovative capital market products to help release market vigor, and improve the systemic design of the capital market through measures such as increasing the transparency of listed companies' information disclosure and carrying out holistic supervision over the A-share market, Fang said.

Yang Chengzhang, a member of the National Committee of the CPPCC and chief economist with Shenwan Hongyuan Securities, told the Global Times on Wednesday that in order to ensure the stable development of the capital market, the government should also continuously put efforts and resources into stemming risks in the property sector, local debt and small and medium-sized financial institutions, as these three sectors are major sources of concern for capital market investors in 2023.

The Government Work Report's call to tackle risks in key areas and beef up security in key sectors will help ease excessive worries and curb the pessimistic outlook in the market, according to Yang Chengzhang.

In order to promote the sound development of the capital market and protect investors' rights and interests, the CSRC has held symposiums to solicit opinions and suggestions on improving the basic system of the capital market, strengthening the protection of the rule of law, and it has also paid visits to listed firms to help them address difficulties to achieve high-quality development.

Since Wu took office, the Chinese A-share market has recovered much of its losses from the recent cycle, finishing at 3,039.93 points at the Shanghai bourse and 9,395.65 points at the Shenzhen bourse on Wednesday.

Following robust travel and tourism activity during the eight-day Spring Festival holidays, the Chinese economy is off to a good start.

Preliminary economic indicators suggest that China is poised to achieve a good start in the first quarter, Zheng Shanjie, head of the National Development and Reform Commission, the country's top economic planner, said at the same press conference.

Zheng revealed that industrial power use grew at 9.7 percent in the January-February period, exports are likely to grow 10 percent year-on-year, indicating robustness in the economy.

Protecting the legitimate rights and interests of investors, especially small and medium-sized consumers, is the core task of the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), Wu Qing, chairman of the CSRC, China's top securities regulator, said in his first appearance before media during the ongoing two sessions.

"In a market like ours, where small- and medium-sized investors account for the vast majority, protecting the legitimate rights and interests of investors is the core task of the CSRC," Wu said.

Ensuring fairness and openness should be the most important principle for market regulators, according to Wu.

Corporate IPOs should never be focused on extracting money from the market and fraud should be resolutely cracked down upon, said Wu.

Wu vowed to aggressively enhance regulatory oversight on companies seeking IPOs and intermediaries in the IPO process and fix loopholes on illegal selling of shares by shareholders.

In Wu's first open appearance to media since he took his new post, Wu said he is still one day short of completing his first month's tenure at the post that oversees the world's second largest capital market.

Wu joked that "I am still learning and am a rookie," adding that he has been listening to ideas from all sides.

Key work for the CSRC will include enhancing regulatory oversight with severe punishment for violators in accordance with the law and rigorously manage the regulatory team, Wu said.

The regulator won't hesitate to act to correct extreme situations when the market seriously deviates from its fundamentals, irrational and violent fluctuations occur, liquidity is exhausted, market panic occurs and serious draining of confidence appears, Wu said.

Wu was appointed as a new chief of the country's top securities regulatory agency on February 7 amid a whirlwind week in the Chinese stock market, marked by swift efforts by the Chinese government to tackle volatility.

Since he took office, the Chinese A share market has recovered much of its recent losses, finishing at 3,039.93 points at the Shanghai bourse and 9,395.65 points at Shenzhen bourse on Wednesday.

In order to promote the healthy development of the capital market and protect investors' rights and interests, the CSRC has held symposiums to listen to opinions and suggestions on improving the basic system of the capital market, strengthening the protection of the rule of law and visiting listed firms to help them address difficulties to achieve high-quality development.

Back in 2004, archaeologists excavated two pits in northern China that looked a lot like homebrewing operations. Constructed between 3400 and 2900 B.C. by the Yangshao culture, each pit contained the remnants of a stove and assorted funnels, pots and amphorae.

Now, Jiajing Wang of Stanford University and colleagues report that the pottery shards contain residue and other evidence of starches, chemicals and plant minerals from specific fermented grains. The ancient beer recipe included broomcorn millet, barley, Job’s tears and tubers — that probably gave the beer a sweet flavor, the team writes May 23 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The findings predate the earliest evidence of barley in China by around 1,000 years. Beer may have been consumed at social gatherings, and brewing, not agriculture, spurred the introduction of barley to China, the researchers argue.

Climate commotion
In “Changing Climate: 10 years after An Inconvenient Truth” (SN: 4/16/16, p. 22), Thomas Sumner reported on the progress scientists have made revising forecasts of the far-reaching effects of climate change — from extreme temperatures and sea level rise to severe drought and human conflict — in the decade since the Oscar-winning film’s release.

Reader response to the article was overwhelming, with hundreds of online comments. Some people enjoyed the in-depth look at climate change science, while others expressed skepticism about humans’ contribution to climate change and a general distrust of climate scientists.

“One of my goals for this article was to highlight that climate change research has itself changed over the last decade,” Sumner says. Scientists are still working to understand how the consequences of atmospheric warming will play out in the coming centuries. But one big message from the last decade of research is that the fundamentals have held up: Natural variability exists, says Sumner, but human activities are largely responsible for the current warming trend.
“The question now is what impact will human contributions have down the line and what should we do to prevent and mitigate those effects,” he says.
Plastic feast
Sarah Schwartz wrote about the discovery of a microbe, Ideonella sakaiensis, that chows down on a hard-to-degrade polymer in “This microbe makes a meal of plastic” (SN: 4/16/16, p. 5).
Online commenters were amazed by this new plastic-gobbling organism. “This is great news,” Dan said. “Our world would be doomed if there wasn’t a microbe able to do this.” Chuckawobbly wondered how long it takes I. sakaiensis to digest the plastic. And Jean Harlow was concerned about the potential by-products of worldwide plastic digestion. “The waste product would be a significant amount … of what?” she asked.

Researchers observed that I. sakaiensis almost completely degraded a thin film of polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, after six weeks in a laboratory. But when extracted from the bacterium, the proteins used to break down plastic begin working in about 18 hours.

I. sakaiensisappears to break PET into smaller molecules, like amino acids and carbon dioxide, says coauthor Kenji Miyamoto of Keio University in Yokohama, Japan. But it would probably be hard for the microbe to break down plastic in the outdoors because of its specific growth requirements, he says. Miyamoto envisions that it could be possible to use the specialized proteins in a closed environment to break PET down into molecules such as terephthalic acid— one of the plastic’s main building blocks, which seems benign in the environment.

Prairie dog predators
Herbivorous prairie dog mothers routinely kill baby ground squirrels that encroach on their territories, researchers found. Competition for resources may be a contributing factor to the killings, Susan Milius reported in “Killer prairie dogs make good moms” (SN: 4/16/16, p. 14).

One reader had other ideas. Audrey Boag wondered if prairie dog moms kill ground squirrels to protect their pups from predation or from diseases carried by the squirrels. “In either case, minimizing the number of ground squirrels would pay in lifetime biological fitness,” she wrote.

“We never observed a ground squirrel kill or injure an adult or juvenile prairie dog,” says study coauthor John Hoogland. “Perhaps such attacks sometimes occur underground.” Hoogland notes that the majority of ground squirrels killed by prairie dogs were juveniles, which are too small to be a threat.

One threat, however, is a species of disease-carrying flea that infests both animals. Hoogland found that prairie dog killers and their offspring had fewer fleas than nonkillers and their offspring, “but this trend was not significant,” he says.

Microscopy Masters asks one thing of citizen scientists: Find proteins in electron microscope images. The task will probably give participants new appreciation for biologists who decipher the structures of teeny, tiny molecules. It’s not easy.

The goal of the online project, created by researchers at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., is to improve biologists’ ability to construct detailed, three-dimensional models of proteins.

Using cryo-electron microscopy — which involves freezing, then imaging a sample — the researchers have taken thousands of photos of their current target, a protein complex involved in breaking down other, unwanted proteins. Each image contains 10 to 100 copies of the complex. It takes that many images to capture a protein from every angle. Once the 2-D images are stitched together, researchers can reconstruct the protein’s globular, 3-D shape at near-atomic resolution.
Microscopy Masters enlists volunteers to do the necessary first step of combing through the photos to find the protein molecules — a time-consuming job that people do better than computers. The task may feel daunting, as each black-and-white image resembles a fuzzy TV screen. Only some of the dark smudges in any given image will be molecules of interest; others will be actual smudges or globs of proteins too jumbled to be of use. Fortunately, a practice tutorial offers a crash course in protein identification. And each image will be classified by many users, alleviating some of the pressure of worrying about marking the wrong thing.

Data from the project will help researchers improve protein-picking computer algorithms, says project member Jacob Bruggemann. That way computers can take over the painstaking work.

SAN DIEGO — On some planets that orbit whirling stars, spring and autumn might be the best time to hit the beach, whereas summer offers a midyear respite from sweltering heat. These worlds’ orbits can take them over regions of their sun that radiate wildly different amounts of heat.

“Seasons on a planet like this must be really strange,” says Jonathon Ahlers, a graduate student at the University of Idaho in Moscow, who presented his findings June 15 at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society.
Some stars spin so fast that they bulge in the middle. That bulge pushes the equator away from the blazing core, making it much cooler than the poles. A fraction of these stars also host planets that travel on cockeyed orbits, which take these worlds alternately over the poles and equator of their sun.

Ahlers developed computer simulations to see how the differences in solar energy combined with the tilted orbits might affect a planet’s seasons. The outcome depends on how the planet’s axis is tipped relative to its orbit. For a world whose north and south poles periodically face the star’s equator, “you get a cooler summer than normal and an extremely cold winter, but spring and autumn can be hotter than summer,” says Ahlers. “You get two distinct hottest times of the year.”

How that plays out depends on how the planet is built: an atmosphere or oceans could mitigate climate extremes. Ahlers has yet to work out those details. “It’s doing a lot,” he says, “but what, I don’t really know yet.”

No, that’s not the sun. It’s Jupiter, ablaze with infrared light in new images taken in preparation for the Juno spacecraft’s July 4 arrival at the king of the planets. This image shows how heat welling up from deep within the planet gets absorbed by gas in the atmosphere, which can tell researchers how stuff moves around beneath Jupiter’s thick blanket of clouds. Juno won’t look for infrared light, but it will (among other things) measure how much microwave radiation is being blocked by water lurking within Jupiter’s atmosphere.

The map is pieced together from multiple images obtained at the Very Large Telescope in Chile over the past several months. Ground-based images such as these will help researchers understand what Juno is peering at each time it swoops in close to Jupiter’s clouds over the next 20 months.