Minister of the International Department of the Communist Party of China Liu Jianchao made a keynote speech at the FutureChina Dialogue 2024 on 27 March co-organised by Business China Singapore, Lianhe Zaobao and ThinkChina. He spoke about Asia’s role amid turbulence and the realignments of relationships among major countries of the world, and China’s role in engaging with the region and working together to build better lives for their peoples. This is an edited transcript of his speech.
Technology
Society
Journalist Chieh-Yi Cheng notes that the traditional ways of food preparation have given way to high-tech production, leading to the improvement of food quality, as well as counterfeiting methods. It now becomes a cat-and-mouse game, with the need to boost efforts in surveillance, tracing funding sources, and tracking the quantity and movement of raw materials and ingredients, in order to nip the problem in the bud.
Technology
Technology expert Yin Ruizhi notes that unlike traditional network-based technology, OpenAI-style AI is not as reliant on networks. Thus, compared with the US, China’s development of AI focuses more on technology rather than expanding user base.
Economy
China looks set to drive its economy by focusing on boosting production, industrial upgrade and promoting “new quality productive forces”. However, there are concerns that a move in this direction could lead to overproduction, impacting global markets. Lianhe Zaobao correspondent Yang Danxu looks into the matter.
Politics
Lianhe Zaobao correspondent Yu Zeyuan notes that to catch up to the US in terms of military might, China has been investing heavily in modernising its armaments, particularly in the areas of aircraft carriers and stealth aircraft technology. Not only that, the PLA also wants to develop its own unique “trump card”.
Economy
Lianhe Zaobao journalist Liu Sha takes a closer look at the Chinese authorities’ frequent meetings with leaders from multinational companies, in particular those from the manufacturing and biopharmaceutical sectors, following the 20th Party Congress. What do these meetings signal, and will they work in terms of stabilising foreign investor confidence?
Technology
Translation studies professor Xiao Weiqing says that large language models will raise the bar for translation, squeezing the survival space for junior and intermediate-level translators and potentially edging them out of the industry. But all is not lost.
Economy
While naysayers have painted a doomsday scenario for Hong Kong since the plummeting of the Hang Seng Index, EAI senior research fellow Yu Hong points to Hong Kong’s strong fundamentals, the vitality of the Greater Bay Area and the knock-on effects of the recovery of the mainland economy. He notes that as long as the mainland economy continues to grow, the Hong Kong stock market will remain attractive to regional and global investors.
Technology
Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionising China's animation industry by cutting production times and generating culturally distinct content. The first episode of Qianqiu Shisong (《千秋诗颂》), China’s first AI-generated animated series, was aired on Chinese state television on 26 February 2024. The series was produced with the help of CMG Media GPT, a generative AI model co-developed by Shanghai Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and state broadcaster China Media Group.