Nigeria Times

By He Yin, People’s Daily

Chinese President Xi Jinping will pay state visits to France, Serbia and Hungary from May 5 to 10. This will be the first visit to Europe by China’s head of state in nearly five years.

Against the backdrop of intensifying global turbulence, the China-EU relationship holds strategic significance and global influence. It bears upon the pillars of world peace, stability, and prosperity.

Xi’s upcoming visits to the three European countries will inject strong impetus into the development of the relations between China and the three countries and the China-EU comprehensive strategic partnership, and bring more stability and positive energy to the fast-changing world.

France is the first major Western country to establish diplomatic relations at the ambassadorial level with the People’s Republic of China. China-France relations have long been at the forefront of China’s relations with Western countries. The unique history of bilateral relations have shaped the “China-France spirit” featuring independence, mutual understanding, foresight, mutual benefit and win-win cooperation.

In recent years, under the strategic guidance of President Xi and President Macron, China-France relations have maintained a sound development momentum, with fruitful strategic communication, practical cooperation, deeper people-to-people and cultural exchanges, and sound communication and coordination in international and regional affairs.

Faced with a complex and volatile international situation, China and France both insist on independence and win-win cooperation, both oppose the division of the world and bloc confrontation, and both practice multilateralism and uphold the UN Charter and international law.

The international community expects China and France to form a common position and speak with same voice on major issues bearing on world peace and stability, as well as the future of mankind.

Xi’s visit marks the second visit by a China’s head of state to France in five years. It coincides with the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between the two countries and is of great significance to building on the past achievements and charting the course for the future.

Further consolidating political mutual trust and strengthening solidarity and cooperation will bring China-France comprehensive strategic partnership to a new level, inject new impetus into the sound and steady development of China-EU relations, and make new contributions to world peace, stability, and progress.

Serbia is China’s first comprehensive strategic partner in Central and Eastern Europe. The two countries have nurtured an iron-clad friendship, serving as a model for friendly relations between China and European countries.

In recent years, under the strategic guidance of President Xi and President Vučić, China-Serbia relations have enjoyed robust growth. The two countries have firmly supported each other on issues of core interests and major concerns, enjoyed solid political mutual trust, achieved fruitful outcomes in high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, and maintained close coordination in multilateral arena. The robust and powerful China-Serbia cooperation is in the fundamental and long-term interests of both countries and peoples.

This visit will be Xi’s second visit to Serbia in eight years. During the visit, the two heads of state will have an in-depth exchange of views on bilateral relations and international and regional issues of mutual interest. The two sides will hold discussions on elevating the positioning of bilateral ties and charting the course for future development.

The upgrading of China-Serbia relations will not only bring greater benefits to the two peoples but also strengthen the power to uphold international fairness and justice, making greater contributions to building a community with a shared future for mankind.

This year marks the 75th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Hungary. Hungary is an important country in Central and Eastern Europe and China’s important partner in Belt and Road cooperation and China-Central and Eastern European countries cooperation.

In recent years, in the face of a complex and volatile international situation, Hungary has remained committed to being a force of peace and stability in Europe, resisting interference and pressure, and steadfastly deepening cooperation with China.

China and Hungary are comprehensive strategic partners who are committed to their respective development in line with their national conditions. The two countries have achieved fruitful results in mutually beneficial cooperation across various fields, bringing tangible benefits to the two peoples. The in-depth cooperation between the two countries demonstrates that China is an opportunity rather than a challenge, a partner rather than a rival for Europe.

The joint invitation extended by Hungarian President Sulyok and Prime Minister Orbán to President Xi to visit Hungary fully demonstrates Hungary’s high regard and earnest expectations for this visit. This milestone visit will elevate bilateral relations to a new level and open a new chapter for China-Hungary friendly cooperation, which is conducive to maintaining regional and global peace, stability, and prosperity.

China and the EU should be characterized rightly as partners, and cooperation should be the defining feature of their relationship. As two major forces advancing multipolarity, two major markets in support of globalization, and two major civilizations championing diversity, China and the EU share extensive common interests, with cooperation and consensus far surpassing competition and disagreements.

China always views its relations with the EU from a strategic, long-term perspective, and takes the EU as a high priority in its external relations. Xi’s state visits to the three European countries will undoubtedly further strengthen mutually beneficial cooperation between China and the EU. This will provide more stability to a turbulent world and inject more impetus into global development.

By Liu Shiyao, Gu Yekai, People’s Daily

At 8:59 p.m. (Beijing Time) on April 25, China’s Shenzhou-18 manned spaceship, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, blasted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China. About 10 minutes after the launch, the Shenzhou-18 spaceship separated from the rocket and entered its designated orbit, marking success of China’s first manned mission in 2024.

The Shenzhou-18 crew members are Ye Guangfu, Li Cong and Li Guangsu, with Ye as the mission commander. The Shenzhou-18 mission is the third manned mission during the application and development stage of China’s space station and the 32nd flight mission of China’s manned space program.

The Shenzhou-18 crew will rotate with the Shenzhou-17 crew in orbit and stay in the space station for about six months, during which they will carry out space science and application experiments, extravehicular activities (EVAs), and cargo transportation, space debris shelters installation, extravehicular payloads and equipment installation and recovery, and popular science education and public welfare activities, to further improve the operational efficiency of the space station.

During the crew’s stay in orbit, they will witness the arrival of the Tianzhou-8 cargo craft and Shenzhou-19 crewed spaceship. The Shenzhou-18 crew are scheduled to return to the Dongfeng landing site in north China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region in late October this year.

China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) spokesperson Lin Xiqiang said the Shenzhou-18 crew will manage and care for the space station and its payloads during their stay in orbit, and conduct maintenance, repairs, and status inspections to ensure the safe, reliable, and efficient operation of the space station.

The crew will utilize the scientific experiment cabinets and extravehicular payloads to carry out more than 90 experiments in the fields of basic physics in microgravity, space material science, space life science, space medicine and space technology.

For instance, they will implement China’s first in-orbit aquatic ecological research project. Using zebrafish and goldfish algae to establish a self-cycling aquatic ecosystem in orbit, the project aims to make to a breakthrough in the cultivation of vertebrates in space.

The crew will also make the world’s first in-orbit stem cell study on the plant’s stem tips to explore plant evolutionary adaptation to gravity and provide theoretical support for space cropping.

So far, China has carried out more than 130 scientific research and application projects in its orbiting space station, and more than 300 scientific experiment samples have been brought back from space by manned missions in five batches.

The Shenzhou-18 astronauts will carry out two to three EVAs and implement six cargo outbound deliveries via the station’s cargo airlock module. During the EVAs, based on the existing space debris protection mechanism at the station, the astronauts will install debris protection reinforcements for extravehicular piping, cables, and critical equipment. They will also carry out extravehicular inspections, as appropriate, to further ensure the safety of the space station.

According to Lin, some of the solar panel cables on the space station were damaged by space debris impacts, leading to a partial loss of power supply capacity. The problem was solved by the Shenzhou-17 crew during two spacewalks, which marked China’s first extravehicular maintenance and proved that manned spacecraft can better deal with unexpected issues in orbit.

In 2023, China initiated the lunar landing mission of its manned lunar exploration program, aiming to realize a manned lunar landing by 2030. All component systems are under research and development as planned.

The project development of major flight products, such as the Long March-10 carrier rocket, the manned spacecraft Mengzhou, the lunar lander Lanyue and the lunar landing suit, has been completed, and their prototype production and tests are being carried out.

The development of mechanical and thermal test products for manned spacecraft and landers has been basically completed; rocket engines of various types are underground tests; and the Wenchang manned lunar exploration launch site is under construction. The proposals for manned lunar rovers and lunar surface payloads solicited from the public are under selection.

By Yin Xiaoyu, People’s Daily

The spring sowing season has arrived, but in the sprawling wheat fields in Lujia township, Kunshan, east China’s Jiangsu province, there wasn’t a farmer in sight across the vast expanse. What could be seen was only a drone hovering above the fields.

“This is an unmanned farm. It spans 3,840 mu (256 hectares) and primarily grows rice and wheat,” said engineer Geng Bojian, who’s engaged in the R&D and regular maintenance of the farm.

This intelligent farm, which features minimal management and unmanned operations, was established last year through the utilization of big data, artificial intelligence, self-organizing communication networks, and a suite of intelligent equipment such as multi-rotor drones, driverless tractors, unmanned harvesters, and smart irrigation gates, according to Geng, who’s also a member of the Yangtze River Delta Academy of Smart Agriculture under the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS).

In recent years, Kunshan has been working to promote the digitalization of agriculture, focusing on smart agricultural machinery and intelligent farming, and striving to build relevant intelligent scenarios.

In 2021, Suzhou and the CAAS signed an agreement to jointly establish the East China Agri-Tech Center, and the unmanned farm was exactly one of the projects launched by the center.

In the unmanned farm, there is a white building – the intelligent command center, also known as the “smart brain” of the farm.

At the center, a young staff member was staring at a big screen displaying live video footage of the wheat fields, with relevant data constantly updating on either side.

The young staff member was performing routine field patrol with a drone.

This “smart brain” comprises modules for crop monitoring, agricultural machinery management, resource management, drone control, agricultural operations, intelligent irrigation, equipment alerts, and analysis and decision-making.

“In the past, a field patrol needed several people riding electric bikes to each plot, with each person inspecting hundreds of mu of land. It would take at least an hour and a half to complete the patrol,” Geng said.

“Now, a drone can cover the entire area in half an hour while simultaneously collecting crop growth data,” he added.

Geng said that in every plot there is a soil condition monitor, which is used to record soil temperature, moisture, and real-time water level.

“The unmanned farm employs an intelligent irrigation system. Once the monitors detect low soil moisture, the system will be activated,” Geng told People’s Daily.

Besides, a small weather monitoring station is set up in the fields, capable of real-time collection of meteorological data such as temperature, humidity, wind speed, and rainfall. In addition, there are also devices like insect monitoring traps and spore catchers.

Shen Junjie is an employee of Jiangsu Provincial Agricultural Reclamation and Development Corporation. He works with three colleagues to manage the agricultural operations of this unmanned farm. Their daily work involves collecting field data with monitoring devices and drones. Based on the data they collect, the intelligent command center would analyze crop growth and provide scientific guidance on farming practices

“Through a mobile app, we receive notifications from the command center and can remotely assign tasks to unmanned agricultural machines,” Shen told People’s Daily.

The unmanned agricultural machines Shen mentioned were parked in a storage facility, all large in size, including cultivators, transplanters, crop sprayers, and harvesters – each equipped with the BeiDou satellite navigation system. All the operators needed to do was to set the routes and tasks, and remotely start the machines.

“These machines weren’t unmanned when they were manufactured. It was our technical team that modified them, and now each one possesses unique skills,” Geng said.

Today, unmanned equipment are employed in the entire rice and wheat production cycle, including plowing, sowing, managing, and harvesting. The cultivators can complete fertilizing, tilling, and sowing operations all at once. The harvesters can monitor harvest quality in real time while reaping, and upload data to relevant platforms. They can even chop and spread the rice straw back into the field or pass it to a baler for organic processing. The harvested rice and wheat is transported by unmanned vehicles to the farm’s drying center for automatic drying and storage.

“In another couple of months, it will be the time to harvest the winter wheat. All the agricultural machines will be in full swing, ” Geng said.

By Wang Haonan, People’s Daily

The 2024 Zhongguancun Forum (ZGC Forum) will be held in Beijing from April 25 to 29. Themed “Innovation: Building a Better World,” this year’s edition will comprise five major sections, including forums and meetings, technology trading, unveiling of achievements, and competitions in cutting-edge fields.

Up to 120 events are planned this year. Over 100 countries and regions, as well as 150 foreign government departments and international organizations will join the forum.

Founded in 2007, with its enduring focus on innovation and development, the forum is an important exchange platform for China to embrace the global innovation network with an open attitude.

It is reported that a total of 60 parallel forums will be held during the 2024 ZGC Forum. According to Chen Jiachang, vice minister of science and technology, Nobel laureate Barry Marshall will deliver a keynote speech on innovation- and curiosity-driven research at the Global Health and Development Forum; Fields Medal winner Shing-Tung Yau will deliver a report on women and scientific development at the Forum on Women in Sci-Tech Innovation; Turing Award winners Joseph Sifakis and Andrew Chi-Chih Yao will share the latest development and future trends in artificial intelligence models at a parallel forum on artificial intelligence.

Internationalization is a major feature of the ZGC Forum. Seventeen parallel forums this year are expected to be hosted and organized by 19 international organizations and foreign government departments.

According to Yu Yingjie, a member of the Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China Beijing Municipal Committee, the UNESCO will host the International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development Forum; the World Intellectual Property Organization will host the Global Science and Technology Clusters Innovation Forum and another parallel forum. Foreign guests from more than 100 countries and regions are expected to participate in these events.

Frontier exploration, achievement sharing, and open collaboration are the prominent features of this year’s ZGC Forum. Chen said that focusing on carbon peaking and neutrality, health, clean energy, and other technological fields that directly impact people’s lives, the ZGC Forum will establish a trading and sharing platform of scientific and technological achievements for multiple countries and regions through events such as the ZGC International Technology Trade Fair and the Zhongguancun International Advanced Technology Competition.

The ZGC International Technology Trade Fair this year will comprise 30 activities, including six technology trade conference for key countries, four debuts of national-level technology commercialization, and eight launches of high-end, sophisticated and cutting-edge products.

It will bring together more than 6,000 innovation projects from over 40 countries and regions such as the UK, France, Germany and Japan, and release a list of 100 new technologies and new products, as well as a list of 100 international technology transaction projects, continuously building itself into a grand international technology trading event.

The Zhongguancun International Advanced Technology Competition for the first time sets four overseas competition areas, with international projects accounting for over 40 percent of the total, Yu said.

According to him, the eight domestic and overseas competition areas of the 2024 Zhongguancun International Advanced Technology Competition have amassed over 3,100 entries from 75 countries and regions, covering areas such as quantum information, photon computing and metaverse.

“The global finals of the competition will be hosted during the 2024 ZGC forum, which will offer comprehensive services for participating enterprises such as investment and financing, commercialization and matchmaking,” Yu said.

A series of major scientific and technological achievements will be unveiled at the opening ceremony, parallel forums and relevant sections of the 2024 ZGC Forum.

A special release event is scheduled to be held on April 29, where a batch of major original achievements, heavyweight innovative policies, and the latest research reports will be released globally, building the ZGC Forum into a “trendsetter” for cutting-edge technologies and future industries.

By Li Jie, People’s Daily

China recently pledged a new round of large-scale equipment upgrades and trade-in of consumer goods in an action plan released by the State Council.

The action plan specifies tasks in four sectors, namely equipment renewal, consumer goods trade-in, used goods recycling, and standard leveling-up.

Equipment upgrades enjoy enormous market potential. According to the statistics released by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) of China, the amount of investment in equipment across crucial sectors, including the industrial and agriculture sectors, reached approximately 4.9 trillion yuan ($676.52 billion) in 2023. With the further advancement of high-quality development in China, the demand for equipment upgrades will get stronger, creating an enormous market worth more than 5 trillion yuan annually.

Take the industrial sector as an example. The total industrial added value in China, a major industrial country, hit 39.9 trillion yuan last year, accounting for 31.7 percent of its GDP.

“The ongoing development of new industrialization will lead to an increased demand for advanced equipment in the industrial sector, making the sector a key area for large-scale equipment upgrades,” said Yu Xiaohui, head of the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology.

Some industrial enterprises in China are still using outdated and inefficient equipment that have served beyond their designed lifespan. As industries quicken their upgrade processes, such equipment needs to be replaced and upgraded.

In recent years, China’s new energy industry has experienced rapid development, with a large number of wind power and photovoltaic devices being employed. Some of these devices would be removed once they surpass their expected lifespan.

According to estimates, by the end of the 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021-2025), the total capacity of outdated wind farms that have served over 20 years in China will exceed 1.2 million kilowatts. Starting from 2030, photovoltaic modules will also enter a period of intensive scrapping. The capacity of waste PV modules to be recycled is expected to hit 17.8 million kilowatts in 2030.

Currently, the Chinese economy is showing signs of steady recovery and improvement, even in the face of insufficient effective demand and weak social expectations.

An official with the NDRC said that promoting large-scale equipment upgrades can not only boost consumption and investment but also increase advanced production capacity, improve productivity, promote energy conservation and carbon reduction, and reduce safety hazards. It benefits both enterprises and the people.

In Wuhan, central China’s Hubei province, China Railway Construction Corporation (CRCC) has built the largest service base for tunnel boring machines (TBM) in central China, with an annual production capacity of 60 units. Old models and outdated machines that have been retired or do not meet technological specifications and energy consumption standards can be upgraded there.

Recently, CRCC decided to expand the TBM service base so as to enlarge its capacity. “Before the end of the first quarter, our schedule has been fully occupied,” said Zhang Kunfeng, general manager of Wuhan heavy equipment company of China Railway 11th Bureau Group Corporation.

Equipment upgrades create business opportunities. “For enterprises, equipment upgrades can be achieved through either purchasing new machines or retrofitting existing ones,” said Zhang.

The cost of retrofitting is usually much lower than purchasing new equipment, he added. According to him, the cost of retrofitting a TBM is only 20 to 25 percent of what it would cost to buy a new one.

The action plan specifies also multiple tasks, including promoting remanufacturing and cascading use, refining energy consumption, emissions and technology standards, and improving technical standards of products.

“This will drive industrial enterprises to phase out outdated and inefficient equipment, encourage the extensive adoption of high-tech, high-efficiency, and high-reliability equipment, and enhance their capability in research and development, design and manufacturing, inspection and testing, thus promoting the high-end development of the manufacturing industry,” said Yu.

Green and low-carbon transformation remains an important task. Sun Ying, deputy director of the energy research institute of the China Academy of Macroeconomic Research, believes that accelerating equipment upgrades and promoting the continuous increase of advanced capacity and efficient products can drive energy conservation and carbon reduction from the source, which can help expand domestic demand and improve energy utilization efficiency in consumer products.

The action plan said China aims to increase its investment in equipment for industry, agriculture, construction, transportation, education, culture, tourism and medical care by at least 25 percent by 2027, compared with 2023.

According to the plan, energy efficiency of major energy-consuming equipment in key industries will essentially achieve energy conservation standards; the proportion of production capacity meeting Grade A level environmental performance will rise significantly; industrial enterprises above the designated size will see the digitalization rate of R&D tools exceeding 90 percent and the computer numerical control rate for key production procedures surpassing 75 percent.

By Jiang Feng, Wang Xinyue, People’s Daily

Located at the junction of the Belt and Road and the Yangtze River Economic Belt, Chongqing municipality is a key strategic fulcrum for the development of China’s western region.

The China (Chongqing) Pilot Free Trade Zone (hereafter referred to as “Chongqing FTZ”) was established in 2017. Despite occupying less than a thousandth of Chongqing’s total area, it has gathered over 190,000 enterprises, including more than a quarter of the municipality’s foreign trade companies, which contribute to about 70 percent of the municipality’s total foreign trade volume.

One of the key characteristics of the Chongqing FTZ is its focus on institutional innovation. It has issued the multimodal transport bill of lading developed by China International Freight Forwarders Association in an attempt to pilot a “single bill of lading” model for rail-sea intermodal transportation. Besides, it provides application scenarios on its cross-border financial blockchain service platform for financing and settlement along the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor (ILSTC), facilitating enterprises’ freight settlement, trade settlement and financing with a total value of over $3.3 billion.

Since its inauguration, the Chongqing FTZ has worked to align its policies with high-standard international economic and trade rules, steadily advancing institutional opening-up.

With a long blast of whistle, a China-Europe freight train loaded with cars slowly pulled out from the Yuzui freight station of Chongqing. Launched by the Guoyuan Port to pilot the full-train-load multimodal cross-border logistics, the train exits China through the Horgos Port in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uyghur autonomous region. It has opened up an efficient and convenient international logistics channel for automakers in Chongqing and its surrounding areas.

The train leaves China in about five days from its departure, which is twice as fast as sea transportation, said Xu Hao, manager of the overseas business development division of Chinese automobile manufacturer Changan Auto, adding that this multimodal logistics model helps the enterprise expand the overseas market.

According to Xu, vehicle brands independently owned by Changan Auto shipped over 100,000 vehicles overseas in the first three months of this year, an increase of 80.1 percent year on year.

In the first quarter of 2024, Chongqing’s auto exports totaled 8.92 billion yuan, up 24.1 percent year on year. In particular, the exports of electric vehicles reached 14,000 units, with a year-on-year growth of 219.4 percent in terms of value.

After settling in the Xiyong Comprehensive Bonded Zone of the Chongqing FTZ, Hewlett-Packard Company experienced the convenience of shipping products through intercontinental railway.

China-Europe freight trains and freight trains of the ILSTC have cheaper fair than air transportation and higher efficiency than sea transportation, thus significantly lowering the logistics cost for enterprises.

Because of this, Hewlett-Packard Company has constantly expanded its production in Chongqing. It has manufactured 400 million computers in the municipality so far.

“Thanks to China-Europe freight trains and freight trains of the ILSTC, the Chongqing FTZ can provide solid logistics support for enterprises and introduce more products to the world, thus achieving a virtuous circle of development in which transportation corridors facilitate logistics, logistics promotes economy and trade, and economy and trade drives industrial development of industries,” said Wang Xin, director of the Chongqing FTZ institutional innovation department of the Chongqing Municipal Commission of Commerce.

With two laptops being manufactured per second, Chongqing contributes to almost one-third of the world’s laptop production, becoming a key global hub for laptop manufacturing in just a few years. This giant leap couldn’t have been made without the improvement of government services in the Chongqing FTZ.

“Nearly 1,000 material codes need to be documented for a single laptop computer, a task that previously demanded customs officers to manually review and file each one separately, leading to a huge workload,” said Cao Huawu, deputy head of the Xiyong Customs, a subsidiary of Chongqing Customs.

“We provide proactive services that allow enterprises to file independently, set their own write-off periods, and engage in self-declaration and self-tax payment, which improves the whole procedure to the greatest extent,” Cao added.

Tech Front (Chongqing) Computer Co., Ltd. is one of the beneficiaries. “Now with just a click of the mouse, we can file on our own,” said Liu Hongliang, the company’s manager. According to him, the company has increased its efficiency in importing and exporting goods by approximately 20 percent.

Over the past few years, the Chongqing FTZ has been developing an open industrial system to gather modern factors in recent years, including intelligent manufacturing equipment, new energy and intelligent connected vehicles, cloud computing, big data, consumer finance, international exhibitions, and cross-border e-commerce, supporting Chongqing in its endeavor to build a hub for inland opening-up.

By Zhong Sheng, People’s Daily

For no good reasons, the United States recently launched a Section 301 investigation into China’s maritime, logistics and shipbuilding sectors, and groundlessly accused China of the so-called “unfair practices,” threatening to impose new restrictions including raising the tariff rates for both steel imports and aluminum imports from China.

Such unilateral and protectionist practice not only hurts the economic and trade relations between China and the United States, but also undermines global economic stability and development.

The petition for the Section 301 investigation initiated by the United States into China’s maritime, logistics, and shipbuilding sectors is filled with unfounded accusations. It misinterprets normal trade and investment activities as damaging to U.S. national security and corporate interests, and wrongly attributes America’s own industry issues to China. This not only lacks factual basis but also goes against economic common sense.

The petition describes the so-called “unfair trade practices” of China as the “biggest obstacle” to the recovery of the American shipbuilding industry. However, as the United States itself has stated, only 1 percent of the world’s commercial vessels are produced in the United States today, and its ranking has dropped from the first place in 1975 to 19th place today.

Multiple researches have shown that the U.S. shipbuilding industry has lost its competitive edge years ago due to overprotection.

According to the Financial Times, the shrinkage in the U.S. shipbuilding industry is a result of several factors, including a hollowing out of shipyards and construction capacity, a decrease in the number of marine engineers and architects, and an overall decline in competitiveness.

The United States accuses China of adopting so-called “non-market” practices while providing discriminatory subsidies worth hundreds of billions of dollars to its own industries. This accusation is baseless. In fact, the development of Chinese industries is a result of enterprises’ efforts to advance technological innovation and actively join market competition.

Take the shipbuilding industry as an example. Chinese shipbuilding companies have strengthened technological innovation, accelerated high-end, intelligent, and green development, actively participated in market competition, and honed their skills in the global market. The development of China’s shipbuilding industry is a natural outcome of international industrial development and China’s comparative advantages.

It’s not the first time for the United States to shift its domestic problems overseas in an attempt to find a cure. The last U.S. administration initiated a Section 301 investigation against China and raised tariffs, which was ruled by the WTO as a violation of its rules.

The terms of the Section 301 are typical examples of unilateralism, and the United States, driven by domestic political needs, has launched a new Section 301 investigation, openly calling for arbitrary adjustments to tariffs on Chinese products, which is a repeated mistake.

Under the excuse of so-called “national security,” the United States politicizes economic and trade issues, formulates discriminatory industrial policies, and sets numerous trade barriers, which will only harm others without benefiting itself.

The shipping industry bears over 80 percent of the global trade transportation and is crucial for global trade and economic growth. The United States’ trade bullying practices not only fail to address its own deep-rooted problems, but also disrupt global industrial and supply chains, hindering the healthy development of the world economy.

In recent years, the United States has implemented a number of measures to suppress China’s economic, trade, and technological advancements. The list of sanctions against Chinese companies keeps growing, which is not about “de-risking” but rather about creating risks.

History has repeatedly proven that for China and the United States, one country’s success is an opportunity for the other. Faced with new and evolving situation in China-U.S. business ties, the two sides should stay committed to mutual respect, mutual benefit and equal-footed consultation, follow economic and market rules, expand and deepen mutually beneficial business cooperation, respect each other’s development rights, and work for win-win outcomes for the two countries and the world at large.

China is willing to develop its relationship with the United States based on the principles of mutual respect, peaceful coexistence, and win-win cooperation. At the same time, China will continue to firmly safeguard its national sovereignty, security, and development interests.

The U.S. side should face its own problems, stop abusing unilateral trade measures, immediately cancel the additional tariffs imposed on China, and return to the rules-based multilateral trading system as soon as possible.

(Zhong Sheng is a pen name often used by People’s Daily to express its views on foreign policy and international affairs.)

By Wu Yuehui, People’s Daily

The first complete high-definition lunar geologic atlas in the world was released in Beijing on April 21. The atlas was drawn by a Chinese scientific research team mainly based on scientific exploration data from the Chang’e Project. With a scale of 1:2.5 million, it is the world’s most precise geological atlas of the whole moon.

This geologic atlas set, available in both Chinese and English, includes the Geologic Atlas of the Lunar Globe and the Map Quadrangles of the Geologic Atlas of the Moon. In particular, the Geologic Atlas of the Lunar Globe consists of the Geologic Map of the Moon, the Lithologic Map of the Moon and the Tectonic Map of the Moon. The Map Quadrangles of the Geologic Atlas of the Moon includes 30 standardized sub-schematic geological maps of the moon.

The world has been using the lunar geologic maps obtained by the Apollo program, but these maps can no longer meet the current and future needs of deep space exploration and scientific research.

Since 2012, academician Ouyang Ziyuan and researcher Liu Jianzhong of the Institute of Geochemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), have led a team of scientists and cartographers from relevant research institutions in compiling a new-generation lunar geologic atlas set, including Jilin University, Shandong University, China University of Geosciences (Beijing), the Institute of Geology of Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences, and the CAS Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research.

With a comprehensive and systematic understanding of the origin and evolution of the moon, the team compiled the atlas based on scientific exploration data gained from China’s Chang’e lunar exploration program and other research results from both Chinese and international missions, Liu said.

By studying and collecting elements such as lunar rock formation, geological structure, and characteristics of the moon in different ages, China made technical specifications and standards of lunar geologic mapping with independent intellectual property rights, and compiled the 1:2.5 million digital lunar geologic atlas set.

A total of 12,341 impact craters, 81 impact basins, 17 types of lithologies and 14 types of structures all over the moon are mapped in the atlas.

A unified classification system for the sub-types of basin formations has been established. Besides, some special elements including landing sites of human probes and points of special elevation are also shown in the atlas.

The atlas set has been integrated into the digital lunar cloud platform built by Chinese scientists, and will serve lunar scientific research and science education, as well as landing site selection, lunar resource exploration and path planning for China’s future lunar exploration projects.

By You Yi, People’s Daily

Can plants grow without soil and sunshine? The answer might be found in a “plant factory” at the Chengdu National Agricultural Science and Technology Center in Chengdu, southwest China’s Sichuan province.

In the plant factory, lettuce plants grow on multi-tier steel racks, bathing the red and blue rays emitted from LED lights fitted at the top of the racks. The factory, with a pinkish glow coming out of its glass walls, exactly resembles a scene in a sci-fi movie.

“Vegetable growing has its ‘production line,’ too. A head of lettuce can mature in just 35 days after the seed is sown if it’s provided with proper nutrients, lighting and temperature. It would take at least twice as long in an open field,” said Yang Qichang, head of the plant factory, pointing to the 20-tier facility.

As the chief scientist of the Institute of Urban Agriculture, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Yang and his team have been dedicated to the plant factory for nearly 20 years.

The plant factory runs this way. A computer commands robotic arms to plant lettuce seedlings onto plates, and then the plates are sent to designated tiers of the racks, where the seedlings receive lighting and nutrient solutions. When the lettuce plants mature, they are withdrawn from the racks and packed after their roots are cut off. Thanks to intelligent management and assistive robots, the plant factory is completely unattended, from seeding to harvesting, and to packing.

Traditional agriculture often faces reduced yields due to meteorological disasters, pests and plant diseases. It’s always difficult to maintain a sound environment for crops. Greenhouse cultivation is an exploration that allows for the cultivation of off-season vegetables, but it is still susceptible to adverse weather conditions such as high temperatures and snow.

Plant factories have shattered the constraints of natural conditions. As an efficient agricultural system that achieves year-round continuous crop production through precise control in a closed environment, a plant factory can adjust environmental factors such as light, temperature, humidity, and nutrients in real-time according to the specific requirements of different crops. This precise supply enables high-efficiency production.

Additionally, plant factories can induce flowering and promote rapid growth, significantly shortening crops’ growth cycle.

Plant factories feature accelerated growth of crops, said Wang Sen, a researcher with the Institute of Urban Agriculture. This type of facility, which is free from the limitations by land, space, and climate conditions, accelerates the growth of crops through a light-nutrient coupling technique. It can shorten the growth period of crops such as rice, wheat, corn, soybeans, cotton, and rapeseed by more than half, providing effective support for accelerating crop breeding.

It’s important to improve lighting efficiency and lower energy consumption when building a plant factory. Wang told People’s Daily that his team has established a database containing 1,238 “lighting solutions” for 72 crop varieties in five major categories, which helps adjust lighting plans based on crop varieties and stages of growth.

Besides, with the application of the light-temperature coupling technology, the plant factory’s overall energy consumption has been lowered by over 56 percent.

To address the issues of low land utilization and spatial efficiency in traditional flat planting, the team adopted vertical cultivation techniques. “This 20-tier vertical farm can increase land utilization by over 120 times,” Yang disclosed.

Today, the 200-square meter plant factory produces over 60 tons of vegetables each year. By adopting self-developed new crop varieties, vertical cultivation systems, automatic nutrient solution supply systems, energy-saving artificial light sources, and AI-based intelligent management systems, the vertical farm has achieved year-round stable food production.

The team is currently exploring profitable business models for the plant factory. It is learned that the high-end leafy vegetables grown in the plant factory target densely populated urban areas such as the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and the Yangtze River Delta, as well as regions with a local vegetable self-sufficiency rate below 10 percent. Furthermore, the plant factory can also be used for intensive seedling cultivation, which not only reduces production costs but also ensures seedling quality.

China’s plant factories are going international. During an international plant factory technology training program hosted by China, students from over 20 countries received systematic training on plant factories. LED “lighting solutions” have been promoted in more than 100 countries and regions. China has also reached agreements with the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, Chile and Qatar to build vertical plant factories.