The next big tech war front: RISC-V

By:
On:
In: Asia

Alibaba’s share price dropped nearly 10% on November 17 on the news it has canceled the spin-off and initial public offering (IPO) of its cloud computing division, marking the latest market tremor to hit China’s sanctioned tech industry.

Alibaba said the cancellation was driven by the disruption caused by US bans on China’s access to advanced proprietary semiconductors made by Arm, Intel, AMD and Nvidia.

At the same time, US sanctions are accelerating China’s development of advanced chips using the RISC-V open standard design architecture, giving rise to US Congress calls to extend the China tech bans to RISC-V.  

RISC-V is an open standard instruction set architecture based on Reduced Instruction Set Computer design principles. It is a free, non-proprietary platform for the development of integrated circuit (IC) processors.

As an alternative to Arm, Intel, AMD and Nvidia, RISC-V is spurring the interest of not only China but also the EU and smaller companies and chip designers.

A China RISC-V Alliance was established in 2018 to create a complete open-source computing ecosystem by 2030.

The RISC concept was conceived at the University of California, Berkeley, in 2010. The RISC-V Foundation was established in 2015 to support and manage the open-source technology, with the Institute of Computing Technologies of the Chinese Academy of Sciences as one of its founders.

Other founding members include Google, Qualcomm, Western Digital, Hitachi and Samsung while other Chinese members include Huawei, ZTE, Tencent and Alibaba Cloud. The association currently has more than 300 corporate, academic and other institutional members around the world.

In 2020, the Foundation was incorporated in Switzerland as the RISC-V International Association, moving out of the United States to avoid potential disruption caused by then-president Donald Trump’s anti-China trade policies.

On October 31, 2023, Alibaba Cloud announced a RISC-V controller chip for enterprise solid state drives (SSDs) at its annual Aspara technology conference in Hangzhou, where the company is headquartered.

Alibaba is banking on RISC-V. Image: Asia Times Files / Agencies

The device was developed by Alibaba’s wholly-owned IC design subsidiary T-Head. It will be used in Alibaba Cloud’s data centers for artificial intelligence (AI) training, big data analytics and other applications.

T-Head develops application-specific ICs for AI, cloud computing, industrial, financial, consumer electronics and other applications. It has also designed an internet of things (IoT) processor based on RISC-V.

Alibaba Cloud has announced the development of new data center servers with improved computational capabilities and energy efficiency. They should help it compete with Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, Alphabet’s Google Cloud Platform and, in China, Tencent, Baidu and Huawei.

At the RISC-V Summit North America 2023 held in Santa Clara, California, on November 7 and 8, Alibaba’s director of AI-generated content (AIGC) David Chen presented what he claimed was the first successful deployment of a RISC-V server cluster in the cloud.

Cluster computing in cloud computing involves using multiple nodes or computers to form a single unit, enabling the system to handle heavier workloads than any computer could run.

Cluster computing can be used in various data-intensive applications ranging from machine learning to financial modeling to scientific simulations. First announced in October, the RISC-V cloud-based server cluster was achieved by T-Head and Sophgo in collaboration with Shandong University.

Sophgo is a developer of RISC-V processors and other open-source computing solutions headquartered in Beijing. The company has R&D centers in more than 10 Chinese cities targeting cloud computing, deep learning, data analytics, video, security, infrastructure and healthcare.

The RISC-V cloud server cluster utilizes processors designed by both T-Head and Sophgo and open-source Linux software. The Linux Foundation and the RISC-V Foundation have been collaborating since 2018.

“Each day, thousands of engineers around the world collaborate and contribute to advance RISC-V, the open-standard instruction set architecture that is defining the future of open computing,” the RISC-V organizers wrote in their introduction to the recent summit.

“The RISC-V community shares the technical investment and helps shape the architecture’s strategic future so everyone may create more rapidly, enjoy unprecedented design freedom, and substantially reduce the cost of innovation. Anyone, anywhere can benefit from these contributions,” the organizers said.

But not if US Congressman Mike Gallagher (R-Wisconsin) and his colleagues have their way.

US congressman Mike Gallagher wants to block China’s access to RISC-V. Image: Epoch Times Screengrab

On November 1, they sent a letter to US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo “to express our concerns about the national security risks posed by the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) significant involvement in RISC-V and the organization’s semiconductor chip design architecture with the explicit purpose of undermining US export controls and leapfrogging our technological leadership in chip design.”

Gallagher is chairman of the Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party. The letter was also signed by Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Illinois), ranking member of the Committee, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida) and 15 other members of Congress.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm were copied on the letter. The letter declared that “Urgent action is needed to prevent US technology and technical know-how from contributing to the PRC’s utilization of this technology.”

Not only is China seeking to use RISC-V to achieve technological self-sufficiency, it aspires to become an “open-source power” and already accounts for half of all RISC-V chips sold worldwide, the letter said.

This could happen because “RISC-V allows the PRC to use open-source architecture to develop advanced chips without needing a license from the US government.”

The letter recommends that all US individuals or companies engaging with China on RISC-V or any other computer instruction set architecture must receive US government licenses, even though RISC-V International is headquartered in Switzerland

The signatories compiled a list of questions for Secretary Raimondo, for which they would like answers by December 1, 2023. The questions include:

  • What is the administration’s plan to prevent the PRC from achieving dominance in the RISC-V technology and leveraging that dominance at the expense of US national and economic security?
  • What are the potential national security risks posed by the expanding use of RISC-V technology? How do existing US government policies related to the use of open-source technologies in sensitive systems address these risks?
  • How is the administration working with US companies to address these potential security risks associated with these technologies?
  • How could the administration apply the authorities provided by the Executive Order 14017 on Securing America’s Supply Chains to address the risks posed by RISC-V to cyber security and US industry?
  • How would PRC dominance in RISC-V hardware affect the cybersecurity concerns related to internet of things and its application to critical infrastructure?

How the Biden administration responds will be a good indicator of how much, if at all, US-China tech tensions have eased since Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in California at last week’s APEC summit.

The letter rightly points out that the intellectual property used to design ICs is currently dominated by Western companies such as Arm, Intel, AMD and Nvidia.

US-based RISC-V IP companies including SiFive, Andes, Qualcomm, Google and others have already been banned from selling their technology to Chinese companies on the Commerce Department’s Entity List without a license.

That, however, is not enough for Gallagher and his colleagues, who write that “the United States should build a robust ecosystem for open-source collaboration among the US and our allies while ensuring the PRC is unable to benefit from that work.”

To do that would require either competing with or expelling China from the RISC-V International organization. Some European politicians might agree with that, but the US politicians who signed the letter are either not aware of or have seemingly ignored the EU’s RISC-V policy.

In February, the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU) announced plans to form a partnership with industry, research institutions, supercomputing centers and other organizations to develop a European high-performance computing (HPC) ecosystem based on RISC-V.

Its mission is to develop, deploy, extend and maintain world-leading supercomputing, quantum computing and related services and data infrastructure in Europe. This is to be supported by a secure supply chain with a wide range of applications contributing to the development of European science and industry. 

The European Chips Act has identified RISC-V as one of the next-generation technologies in which Europe should invest to build and reinforce its capacity to innovate in the design, manufacturing and packaging of advanced, energy-efficient and secure integrated circuits, and turn them into marketable products ranging from micro-controllers to high-end chips used in data centers and supercomputers, the EuroHPC JU’s website says.

The EU sees a future in RISC-V technology. Image: Silicon Republic / Facebook

The technology should be linked to its use in industry in order to make sure that it addresses European market needs and “contributes to digital sovereignty beyond scientific HPC,” the website says.  

“RISC-V technology is a credible energy-efficient alternative to the proprietary solutions for processors and accelerators across the computing continuum that are produced outside the EU.”  

In other words, RISC-V is an alternative to Arm, Intel, AMD and Nvidia. Many US politicians view RISC-V as part of a new Cold War in the tech realm. The EU, like China, views it as a way to escape US dominance of advanced computing.

It remains to be seen whether the US will subvert open-source technology in what will likely amount to a futile attempt to protect and maintain its high-tech hegemony.

Follow this writer on Twitter: @ScottFo83517667

Continue Reading

Governments use IMF bailouts to hurt political foes: study

By:
On:
In: Asia

Sri Lanka received a bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in March amid soaring inflation, debt and a sovereign default.

In exchange for US$3 billion, the government committed to spending cuts and tax and financial sector reforms. Leading to protests in the streets of Colombo, these measures have prevented Sri Lankan wages from recovering after they fell by almost half in real terms during the preceding financial crisis.

Sri Lankans’ experience of these measures has been far from uniform. Emerging evidence indicates that the government — led by Ranil Wickremesinghe, part of the Buddhist Sinhalese majority — has concentrated the burdens primarily on ethnic minorities, which include many of the poorest people in Sri Lanka and which typically support the opposition.

The government has sought to protect the primarily Buddhist Sinhalese elite by avoiding imposing wealth taxes and only making small increases in corporation tax. It has placed the cost burden of austerity on low-income people by doubling the value-added tax rate to 15%.

It has also doubled the tax that people pay on pension fund returns. Again, this hits poor ethnic minorities hardest because they frequently earn too little to pay income tax.

Unfortunately, this experience is part of a worldwide pattern. Our new book, IMF Lending: Partisanship, Punishment and Protest, shows how governments lump the burden of adjustment on opposition supporters while shielding their own backers – in other words, using IMF programs for political gain.

IMF programs and past research

Scholars have long noted that IMF restructuring programs create winners and losers, but always in relation to different sectors of the economy. For example, the fact that programs attempt to strengthen exports has been shown to favor farmers and business owners over urban middle-class state employees like civil servants.

The problem with purely comparing sectors is highlighted when you look at citizens’ experiences. One segment of the survey data we used in our research, covering nine countries in Africa, showed that three out of ten civil servants actually thought IMF reforms made their lives better, while a similar proportion observed no difference.

Admittedly this data is from 1999-2001, since none of the more recent surveys that we used asked this question, but it raises an important point: If IMF reforms are entirely bad for the civil service, why are so many civil servants upbeat about the effects? Politics is likely to be the missing piece of the puzzle.

Citizens’ views of IMF programs in their countries

Chart showing how citizens viewed IMF programmes in their countries
Based on 659 civil servants from Afrobarometer (1999-2001), covering Ghana, Malawi, Mali, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Afrobarometer

An extensive academic literature already shows that governments often use their discretion to play politics over development loans. For example, a recent study found that projects funded with Chinese money are more likely to be undertaken in the birth region of a political leader.

IMF programs are commonly assumed to narrow borrowing governments’ policy options, but that is an oversimplification. Borrowers certainly have less overall freedom over economic policy, but they maintain broad discretion in how they implement loan conditions. Our study is the first to quantify how they use this discretion and examine the consequences for protests within the countries in question.

Our study

We collected individual survey data from over 100 countries from four widely used sources: Afrobarometer, Asian Barometer, Latinobarómetro and the World Values Surveys. The study covers a 40-year timespan up to the late 2010s, with periods varying from region to region.

We first examined whether opposition supporters had different experiences of reforms than government supporters. Sure enough, these were indeed more negative.

We worried this might be because opposition people are more critical of their governments in general. So we compared countries that had just experienced restructuring programs with others that had not – and found that sentiment among opposition supporters was much more negative in borrower countries.

The following graph explains, showing that opposition supporters in countries on IMF programs suffer relatively more deprivation than government supporters compared with countries not in programs.

Partisan deprivation in IMF v non-IMF countries

Graph showing how opposition supporters are affected by IMF programmes
Based on 101,055 individuals from 46 countries surveyed in 2011-18. World Values Survey

This “partisan gap” was also wider in countries that went through more burdensome recent IMF adjustments, which points to the same conclusion.

Partisan deprivation by severity of IMF restructuring

Graph showing deprivation of opposition supporters in less and more severe IMF programmes
Based on 101,055 individuals from 46 countries surveyed in 2011-18. World Values Survey

The effect on protest

We expected that this highly unequal treatment would increase the chances of protest – especially protest stoked by opposition politicians. This, too, was robustly supported across the surveys.

In Africa, people who reported being worse off due to the structural adjustment programs were more likely to protest. Opposition supporters as a whole were also more likely to protest, especially if their country had just experienced a more severe IMF program.

Again, this data was from 1999-2001. Nonetheless, the other surveys also showed that protest was more likely among opposition supporters, especially during times of high pressure for adjustment.

What can be done?

Scholars normally blame the increase in inequality caused by IMF programs on the loan conditions, but the effects are clearly amplified by governments’ policy choices. How could this situation be improved?

The IMF could require borrower countries to impose loan conditions in a non-partisan way, but would probably argue that its mandate prohibits considering domestic politics. Policing this would also be very difficult and time-consuming.

An alternative would be for the IMF to tame its demands on borrower countries. This would reduce the burdens that could be inflicted on opposition supporters. Economists might warn that this could encourage countries to be more financially irresponsible.

Equally, however, it ought to make it more likely that adjustment programs will be completed, thereby making the borrowing countries more economically resilient in the future. It would also avoid adverse reactions from financial markets against a country that broke conditions.

Another potential avenue is to let opposition parties and civil society organizations participate in bailout negotiations. This would ensure everyone “owns” the bailout, and might even make it harder for incumbent governments to exploit policy conditions for political gain.

M. Rodwan Abouharb is an associate professor in international relations at University College London; Bernhard Reinsberg is a reader in politics, at the University of Glasgow.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Continue Reading

Evolving Japan-Philippines security ties

By:
On:
In: Asia

Japan’s natural security ally in Southeast Asia is the Philippines. That country, which is an archipelagic nation like Japan, has seen a continuous increase in security pressure from Beijing.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida visited the Philippines on November 3 and met with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The two leaders agreed on expanding their bilateral defense cooperation to address security challenges due to China’s growing military activities in the South and East China Seas.

The two reached an agreement on starting negotiations for a defense pact, a Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) that would help facilitate the presence of visiting forces and further conduct military training activities collectively. 

Kishida asserted that a defense agreement with the Philippines would allow the deployment of Japanese troops to the country, which would strengthen ties between the two nations and work on countering China’s aggressive behavior. There have been increased tensions in the East and South China Seas and both Tokyo and Manila are locked in territorial disputes with China. 

In June, Japan had sent a coast-guard patrol ship, the Akitsushima, to the Philippines and participated in a trilateral exercise with the US and the Philippines. Long-standing treaty allies of the United States are Japan and the Philippines. Because of this, their armed forces have been exposed to and probably impacted by American military tactics for a long time, which facilitates cooperation among them.

Moreover, Japanese leaders believe that stronger security ties with the Philippines could bolster deterrence in the Western Pacific. Japan has been steadily expanding its security engagement with the Philippines as Tokyo is also trying to move away from its pacifist stance, which was explicitly evident in its revised National Security Strategy document that came out in December 2022. 

Both Japan and the Philippines explored the idea of such an agreement in 2015. However, this has now taken an urgency due to China’s assertive behavior.

As part of its Official Security Assistance (OSA) program, Japan intends to donate coastal radar systems to the Philippine Navy, valued at about $4 million, to enhance its capabilities. With the announcement in April that the Philippines will be among the primary beneficiaries of the aid program, Japan has given Manila access to air surveillance radars, satellite communications equipment, and coast-guard vessels.

Moreover, with the launch of the OSA, Japan has broken with its long-standing policy of not using development aid for anything other than disaster relief in the military.

The Terms of Reference (TOR) pertaining to the Japan Self-Defense Forces’ (JSDF’s) humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR) operations in the Philippines were already signed by the two leaders in February. The two nations are currently preparing to expand their cooperation into the military sphere.

Relations between the two nations date back at least six decades. Japan is the largest supporter of infrastructure development in the Philippines, contributing funds to the construction of bridges, railroads, and the Manila subway, among other projects.

Concerns have been expressed regarding China’s objectives in the region and readiness to abide by international law and standards due to its military buildup and increasingly assertive maritime maneuvers. Beijing claims that because it has “indisputable sovereignty” over some South China Sea islands, its activities are legal.

Perhaps nowhere are these worries more felt than in the Philippines, where Chinese warships have been obstructing fishermen’s passage and Manila is unable properly to explore oil and gas deposits in a region that an international tribunal has determined to be part of its exclusive economic zone.

In the contested waters, tensions between China and the Philippines have recently increased. Chinese ships crashed into a Philippine Coast Guard ship and a supply boat in the South China Sea in October. Japan and the US both condemned the incidents and reaffirmed their commitment to support the Philippines in the event of an armed attack.

Japan denounced the incident and sided with the Philippines in preserving the maritime order, while Manila accused Beijing of purposefully colliding with its boats. It is evident that Manila’s and Tokyo’s decision to strengthen security ties was significantly influenced by their growing concerns about an increasingly assertive China.

Way forward

The two nations are in the process of negotiating a Reciprocal Access Agreement, which may enable cooperative military exercises and other joint operations by their armed forces. The Philippines has similar agreements with both the United States and Australia, and Japan has separate agreements of a similar nature with the United Kingdom and Australia.

The Philippines is seen as essential to preserving regional security and stability because of its location relatively close to Taiwan and along important maritime trade routes. This is because there are worries in some circles that a crisis similar to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could arise in the region.

An RAA between Japan and the Philippines would facilitate joint exercises and give the JSDF more access to Philippine bases, possibly even enabling rotational deployments. Such an agreement would also greatly facilitate the JSDF’s deployment to the Philippines during emergencies such as natural disasters.

Furthermore, the agreement would enhance trilateral collaboration with US military forces. The United States was able significantly to strengthen its defense posture in the disputed South China Sea and close to Taiwan this year thanks to an agreement reached by Washington and Manila that allowed access to four more military installations in the Philippines. 

The Marcos administration canceled several development projects under Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative and suspended a military exchange program with China because of the recent severe deterioration of Sino-Philippine relations.

Kishida’s visit to Manila also included a number of agreements in the tourism and infrastructure sectors, coinciding with the two nations’ strategic alignment on matters of defense and security. They not only share the same interests in the area of maritime security, but they also agree that resistance to Chinese coercion is necessary.

Japan aims to uphold the US-dominated “rules-based international order” and secure the “free and open Indo-Pacific” vision amid growing concerns over China.

It is unlikely that the Philippines is the only nation that would welcome increased security cooperation with Japan given China’s persistently assertive actions. Most notably, Vietnam has accepted Japan’s offers of patrol boats and participated in maritime drills with it. Meanwhile, it has been suggested that Japan may provide military support to Fiji and Malaysia in the future.

Though it has undoubtedly gotten off to a slow start, Japanese security engagement could soon pick up momentum.

Continue Reading

Supermagnets changing the rules of nuclear fusion

By:
On:
In: Asia

This is the seventh installment in Asia Times Science Editor Jonathan Tennenbaum’s series “Fusion Diary.” Read part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, Part 5 and Part 6.

During my August visit to nuclear fusion facilities in the UK, I spent an afternoon at Tokamak Energy Ltd, one of the world’s leading private fusion companies. Tokamak Energy’s basic strategy is to apply the technology of high-temperature superconductors to build compact spherical tokamak reactors with super-intense magnetic fields, capable of achieving fusion conditions with high efficiency and at low cost.

Tokamak Energy is the only private fusion company that has more than 10 years’ experience of designing, building and operating its own tokamak devices. The company is pursuing an ambitious timeline, aiming to build a prototype electricity-producing fusion plant that would go onto the grid in the 2030s. 

Tokamak Energy has so far attracted over US$200 million in private investments, and possesses a substantial amount of intellectual property, among other things through its ground-breaking innovations in the area of high-temperature superconducting magnets. 

In contrast to many private fusion companies, Tokamak Energy is fully integrated into international fusion research, regularly publishing its results in peer-referred papers and working in partnership with institutions such as the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, University of Illinois, CERN in Geneva and others. Tokamak Energy’s UA subsidiary was selected for an award as part of the US Milestone-Based Fusion Development Program.

Spherical tokamaks built and operated by Tokamak Energy  Left: ST25  Right: ST40    Photos: Tokamak Energy

Last year the company’s ST40 tokamak achieved a record temperature of over 100 million degrees Celsius – the highest temperature reached in a privately owned spherical tokamak reactor so far and a threshold for commercial fusion. ST40 operates with magnetic fields that are 3-5 times more intense than those of other spherical tokamak devices, such as the MAST-U or the USA’s “National Spherical Torus Experiment” (NSTX).

In addition to the temperature record, experiments on ST40 since 2018 have provided a wealth of data underlining the feasibility of achieving practical fusion power with this type of reactor. They support the UK government’s decision to place its chief bets on the spherical tokamak – rather than the conventional doughnut-shaped design adopted by other nations – in the race to fusion.

Left: Hot plasma in the vacuum chamber of Tokamak Energy’s ST40 reactor  Right: Tokamak Energy Chief Technical Advisor Paul Thomas, left, with the author in the ST40 control room.  Photos: Tokamak Energy

ST40 also validated a novel method of heating the plasma, called “merging compression.” Using a special set of magnetic coils, two rings of plasma are merged together, causing an event known as “magnetic reconnection” in which magnetic energy, stored in the plasma rings, is converted into heat.

YouTube video

[embedded content]

Source: YouTube

Merging compression was used in last year’s experiments demonstrating record 100 million-degree temperatures.

While ST40 uses conventional copper coils, Tokamak Energy has already successfully employed high-temperature superconducting (HTS) coils in a smaller experimental device, the ST25. The next step after ST40 is larger device, christened STX, which will use 100% HTS coils and operate at much higher magnetic fields.

This device, scheduled for build completion in the late 2020s, is intended to demonstrate multiple advanced technologies required for fusion energy and inform the design of a fusion pilot plant. The plan is for the fusion pilot plant to demonstrate the capability of delivering electricity into the grid in the 2030s, paving the way for globally deployable 500-megawatt commercial plants.

A leader in high-temperature superconducting magnet technology

A particular focus of Tokamak Energy’s activity is the development of “super-magnets” employing high-temperature superconductors (HTS). The company is a world leader in this area. HTS coils capable of producing ultra-intense magnetic fields are key to the company’s strategy for achieving fusion, while having countless applications in other areas.

In my next article, I shall describe some of Tokamak Energy’s ground-breaking innovations in the area of HTS magnets.

Earlier this year Tokamak Energy entered into an agreement with the giant US firm General Atomics to collaborate on HTS technology for fusion energy and other industrial applications. GA is a leading high-technology company active in the fields of fission and fusion energy, defense and aerospace. The two companies announced that their collaboration “will leverage GA’s world-leading capabilities for manufacturing large-scale magnet systems and Tokamak Energy’s pioneering expertise in HTS magnet technologies.”

How Tokamak Energy began

David Kingham. Photo: Tokamak Energy

During my visit, I had the opportunity to talk with Tokamak Energy cofounder David Kingham about the company’s history and its future perspectives.

Jonathan Tennenbaum: Could you tell me a bit about the background of your company, and how you came to be building spherical tokamaks?

David Kingham: Back in the late 1970s, early ’80s, a guy called Martin Peng was working on the theory of spherical tokamaks. That work was picked up by Alan Sykes at Culham in the 1980s and they could see theoretically the plasma physics was going to get better. But somebody had to build one of these without knowing what was going to come out.

Alan Sykes basically badgered the director of Culham to build one, and he wouldn’t shut up about it. He said, “Let me build one.”

“There’s no budget.”

Alan Sykes. Photo: Tokamak Energy

“I don’t need a budget. just let me build it.”

So eventually the director gave way and said, “Okay. We’re not going to announce it in any budgets. You can borrow some stuff from some old tokamak and see what you can do.” So he cobbled this device together. He found a big enough vacuum vessel and the device is now known as START.

What it did was show very good plasma confinement and demonstrate high beta. People got pretty excited in the late 90s about its performance. My cofounder Mikhail Gryaznevich had joined START as one of the key scientists. He was behind this demonstration of high beta and high performance in START.

Then the UK government said, Oh, that’s interesting. That could be our next device. The spherical tokamak seemed to be a better way to go and UKAEA described it as probably the best option for the long term for fusion power. That was known and well-accepted in 2000.

UKAEA was running JET at the time, and JET had achieved 16 MW of fusion power.  At the same time, the people at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory that ran TFTR (the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor) successfully and got to 10 MW of fusion power also realized the spherical tokamak would be the way forward for them. So two devices were then built. MAST in the UK, at Culham, and NSTX in Princeton, both during the early 2000s. Both produced really exciting results, again validating the physics of the spherical tokamak.

Both were upgraded rather slowly from about 2012 onwards. Then we came on the scene and decided we would build ST40. We’d take the knowledge from NSTX and MAST. What we wanted to do was to go smaller and double or more the magnetic field. That’s our basic thesis. Go for a higher magnetic field. Then you can have a more compact device and you can sort out all the other engineering challenges by collaboration or just trial and error. 

In 2009 we formed the company, myself and Mikhail Gryaznevich, who’s now the chief scientist. The rationale was: The physics of the spherical tokamak is so good, it’s worth solving the very difficult engineering challenges.

Early on, we were looking at high-temperature superconductors, but it wasn’t really until 2011 that we did our first serious experiments with high-temperature superconductors. We did that by borrowing a tokamak in Prague and asking them nicely if we could replace their poloidal field coils with high-temperature superconducting magnets. So we did that and it worked. And we found the material was relatively easy to use and quite robust.

That set us on a pathway – spherical tokamak plus high-temperature superconducting magnets. The technologies match because you have a very narrow center column in the device. So you want a high-temperature superconductor, you want that very high current density. That gave us a solid foundation for the business from which we could build more intellectual property, and attract private investment.

Moving on, we attracted more and more private investment. Starting at a million pounds or less, the investment got up towards 10 million. In total, we’ve raised about 150 million pounds so far.

We have had support from the UK and US governments. The US Department of Energy supported research on ST40 and the UK government gave us significant grants and R&D subsidies. Princeton really got behind ST40. They’ve been really helpful on the physics, the data interpretation, experimental campaign advice and so forth.

We started to scale up. We always wanted to build prototypes and demonstrate performance rather than do too much theoretically or in subsystems. So we built one tokamak out of copper at small scale, and one using high-temperature superconducting magnets, but at a very low field, and that worked.

Then we decided to scale up quickly: to develop the ST40 with copper magnets, and in parallel, high-temperature superconducting magnets. So that’s where we are at the moment, planning our next device.

David Kingham (at right) with Member of Parliament David Johnston, in the ST40 control room. Photo: Tokamak Energy

JT: So what is your strategy moving forward?

DK: Fusion can’t be delivered by private companies or governments alone. The science horsepower of national laboratories with the speed and agility of a private company working together is very powerful. The US Department of Energy has set the target of a fusion pilot plant on grid within 10 years, and we have recently been awarded a grant as part of that process.

We like the time scale and ambition of that program.

JT: What would your role be in STEP?

DK: It’s also a great endorsement of our approach and technology that the UK’s fusion prototype plant [STEP] will be a spherical tokamak with HTS magnets. We are extremely excited about the UK’s investment in STEP and believe we can bring real value to the program with our extensive knowledge of spherical tokamak design and operation, along with our HTS magnet technology.

JT: In the meantime, I understand that you are planning to build another spherical tokamak.

DK: We would like to build some form of intermediate device that is before a pilot plant, say on a three- or four-year timeline from here, to de-risk technology. But that is essentially an option in our business plan rather than an essential part of it.

The overall business plan now is really to build up intellectual property and to become an IP provider to various consortia who will develop fusion energy. We’re pushing for this relatively capital-light, IP-intensive business model.

Warren East has recently joined our board. He was previously chief executive of Rolls-Royce. Before that, he was chief executive of ARM, which is just about to float at a $70 billion valuation. It’s a fabless semiconductor company based out of Cambridge, and it designs chips for everybody. It has protected its intellectual property around the high-performance chips.

So this is the business model that we’re aiming for: to have control of the greatest ownership of the highest-value components of future fusion reactor control systems, magnets, some novel materials, and some design capabilities.

Next: The magnet wizards

Jonathan Tennenbaum, PhD (mathematics), is a former editor of FUSION magazine and has written on a wide variety of topics in science and technology, including several books on nuclear energy.

Continue Reading

At COP28, a chance for the West to make amends

By:
On:
In: Asia

The West often engages in moral grandstanding when addressing critical global issues like climate change, emphasizing the need for action and accountability. But when it comes to taking responsibility for historic carbon emissions, the developed world often falls short of its obligations.

This disparity between rhetoric and action has significant implications, particularly for vulnerable nations. The Loss and Damages Fund, a significant achievement of the COP27 summit last year in Egypt, highlights this disconnect.

The increasing severity, breadth, and regularity of climate calamities has disproportionately affected developing countries, as evidenced by the Global Climate Risk Index 2021. Of the 10 most affected territories and countries between 2000 and 2019, all were in the developing world.

The Gr9up of 77 and China played a pivotal role in including finance for loss and damages at COP27. The emphasis was on framing this mechanism as a global commitment rather than liability or compensation. The result was collective acknowledgment of the asymmetric impacts of climate change and a step toward rectifying these imbalances.

However, the path to operationalizing the fund is fraught with obstacles. The impasse at an October meeting on the topic cast doubt over the process, particularly concerning the fund’s practical implementation.

Fortunately, a breakthrough was achieved at a follow-up meeting in Abu Dhabi this month. The text adopted there will form the basis of a final decision at COP28 in Dubai in December. Even before that meeting starts, the deal on loss and damages already has the potential to become one of the meeting’s greatest achievements.

Yet even amid progress, the adopted text reveals three issues that hint at how difficult it will be to implement the fund. The success of COP28 in addressing these issues will be a test of the international community’s commitment to equitable climate action.

The first point of contention concerns identification of fund contributors. Developing nations advocate for financial commitments from developed countries, while the United States and Europe assert that emerging economies, notably China and Gulf nations such as Saudi Arabia, should share financial responsibilities equitably.

During preparatory meetings for COP28, the Saudi delegation reportedly referred to historical “failures on obligations and gaps in action” by Western nations during and after the Industrial Revolution, an opinion shared by many leaders in developing countries.

The West has a history of falling short in funding climate action. A 2009 promise to mobilize US$100 billion annually for developing countries by 2020 was never met. It’s high time the West matches its rhetoric with financial commitment. COP28 is the place to deliver.

While the developing world is open to funding from non-governmental sources like the private sector and humanitarian groups, the primary responsibility lies with Western governments. Failure to step up could mean either the loss and damages fund remains non-operational, or its scale is too small to impact climate-change mitigation and adaptation significantly.

The second key challenge for COP28 is pinpointing which nations should benefit from the fund. At COP27, the definition of “particularly vulnerable” sparked debate – a matter still unresolved. COP28 must clarify this. It’s a complex issue; assessing loss and damages goes beyond simple economic factors to include losses that are less tangible and harder to measure, like those from gradual environmental changes.

There’s also a gap between what affected communities experience and the data collected by governments and organizations. Localized impacts may seem more pressing than the broader climate context, complicating the creation of effective responses.

The third challenge revolves around the location and administration of the fund. Western countries, particularly the US and the European Union, favored housing the fund within the World Bank, an idea that developing countries have strongly opposed.

Opposition was rooted in concerns that the World Bank’s loan-based financing model was unsuitable for debt-burdened developing countries, and that the bank’s decision-making process was too heavily influenced by its major donors, particularly the US. Moreover, high administrative fees associated with the World Bank have further fueled resistance.

Despite these reservations, developing countries made a substantial concession by agreeing to an interim arrangement where the fund would be housed in the World Bank for four years, under conditions that included direct access to grants and inclusivity of non-World Bank member states. But if the rest of the demands of the developing world are not met, they can easily do away with this concession.

Thus COP28 faces a crucial task in making the Loss and Damages Fund operational. If successful, next month in Dubai will mark a significant victory for the Global South and those communities bearing the brunt of the West’s historical emissions. This momentous step could pivot the scales toward a fairer climate future.

This article was provided by Syndication Bureau, which holds copyright.

Continue Reading

The rubble of America’s ‘rules-based order’ in Gaza

By:
On:
In: Asia

The White House lit up with spooky colors and inflatable pumpkins for Halloween last month. President Joe Biden handed out chocolate boxes to costume-clad kids who lined up to meet him, and adorably feigned horror at some of their costumes. Among the kids were Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s son, who came dressed as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and daughter, who came dressed as Ukraine itself. 

Nobody came to Biden’s party dressed as Israel or Palestine, where, half a world away, the war was getting even more horrific, with Israel beginning to target the most densely populated areas of Gaza as part of its retaliation to the Hamas terror attacks that killed 1,400 Israelis on October 7.

Israeli air strikes pounded Gaza’s largest refugee camp, flattening apartment buildings and triggering apocalyptic scenes. Children were seen carrying other injured children to safety amid hysterical screams, picking their way through the gray dust and the fresh rubble scattered with the dead and the dying.

Six times as many children have been killed in Gaza in the three weeks of the conflict than the total number of children killed in the entire Ukraine war. More than 10,000 Palestinians have been killed so far in Gaza, which the UNICEF calls a “graveyard” for children, who account for more than 40% of the dead.

The UN Children’s Fund estimates 420 children are killed or injured in Gaza every day, “a number which should shake each of us to our core.” An unshaken Biden, who has extended unconditional support and military assistance to Israel and has opposed a ceasefire, has feigned disbelief at the numbers.

That puts him at odds with the outpouring of global condemnation at the impunity with which civilian lives are being erased in what the United Nations calls “collective punishment.” Israeli historian Raz Segal, who studies Holocaust and modern genocide, calls it a “textbook case of genocide.”  

Even national leaders, many of them close US allies, are not mincing their words and are breaking ranks with the American policy of de facto carte blanche. As the war intensifies and the body bags pile up, US double standards on the victims of Ukraine and Gaza invasions become glaringly obvious, especially in the Global South that is often subject to American sermons on liberty and human rights.

These days the only thing the leading custodian of the liberal international order seems to be liberal with is brown bodies.

Broad condemnation

Like Segal, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva sees the military campaign as a genocide. Malaysian Prime Minister and democracy icon Anwar Ibrahim calls it “height of barbarism.” Belgium wants sanctions on Israel for the “inhumane” air strikes. France wants Israel to stop bombing and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Israel needs to stop killing babies.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, another US ally, stresses that “every Palestinian life matters” and is urging Israel to observe the rules of war, which UN Secretary General António Guterres accuses Israel of grossly violating. 

The high priests of the liberal order are invoking anti-Semitism to combat any critique of Israel. France is considering jail terms for “insults” to Israel, while the British government likens anti-war demonstrations to “hate marches.”

But to many people outside the West and the Islamic world – with no natural solidarity with the Palestinians or baggage of guilt about Holocaust that automatically treats criticism of the Israeli state as anti-Semitism – the human tragedy wreaked on Gaza is simply unacceptable. 

The heartbreaking images from the conflict evoke horror at the unrestrained mutilation of the norms of accepted state behavior, and the helplessness of the global system of laws and institutions in stopping it. Gaza increasingly looks like the killing fields of the “rules-based order” that the Biden administration has made its mantra. If this carnage in Gaza is part of an “order” of any kind, pray what disorder looks like.

This wouldn’t be the first time for the rules-based order to be profaned, of course. Israel is only pummeling what little credibility was left of it after the unilateral excesses of Iraq and Ukraine invasions.

But the international backlash on Gaza reflects an unprecedented crisis of moral authority of the liberal order, in particular the US, which has spearheaded its making since the end of the Second World War and embedded its global leadership in its institutions.

Gaza raises serious questions about America’s actions and judgment, and by extension the very legitimacy of the liberal order that it evangelizes. Questions like, what is the rationale of pulling out troops from Afghanistan to leave its people to their fate in the hands of the Taliban and then surging troops in the Middle East? Or, what is the rationale of opposing occupation in Ukraine and backing it in Gaza? Or, why is it that the only Muslims that America seems to care about are the ones who live in China?

In a world horrified by the sights of Gaza, the optics of Biden flying to Israel and hugging its leader, America’s casual acceptance of the inevitability of mass-scale civilian deaths in Gaza, its blocking of even “humanitarian pauses” in the UN to get in lifesaving aid, and its assistance to Israel to carry on the war, call into question like never before the fairness and capability of the current rules-based multilateralism, as well as America’s credentials in leading it. 

UN failures

The UN system is at the core of this liberal multilateral order, and its current state is a fair indicator as to why the liberal order is flailing. Presenting the plan to set up the United Nations, US president Franklin Roosevelt promised Congress in 1945 that it would “spell the end of the system of unilateral action, the exclusive alliances, the spheres of influence, the balances of power, and all the other expedients that have been tried for centuries.”

Let alone stopping the unilateral bombing in Gaza, the UN has failed even to protect its own staff from it. More than a hundred  of its members have been killed in Israeli bombardment of UN facilities, which are supposedly inviolable in conflict situations as a matter of rule.

Vested with the authority to enforce peace, the UN has seldom looked this powerless. Its helpless pleas for peace on social media make it look every bit the sideshow that it has been reduced to – by the very power that swears by it.

The grand promise of the “rules-based order” that Biden dangles to the Global South has thus never rung hollower. His administration uses it as a catch phrase to consolidate a global alliance against an ascendant China that it claims is out to wreck the liberal order.

But China has in fact shown much greater respect for the “rules” in this conflict and has come across as a more responsible power by firmly opposing Israel’s retaliatory excesses and calling for a ceasefire, unlike America’s steadfast opposition to it despite the UN’s repeated appeals. 

America’s response to the crisis has undermined both its assertions of moral superiority over its new cold-war rival and the liberal order, which has already been under scrutiny.

Quest for alternatives

The new powers in an emerging multipolar world argue that it is too West-centric and lacks diversity and accountability. Global South groupings like BRICS are seen as budding platforms prepping for an alternative alignment of power with a different set of rules of engagement. Might Gaza hasten the process? Could the liberal order survive the single greatest instance of its delegitimization?

These may be trying times for the liberal order, which is bad news at a time of a worldwide rise of right-wing authoritarians peddling toxic nationalism. But it may still not be the end of days for it. The Global South is hardly a homogenous entity. Sample the difference between India’s strong backing of Israel and the pro-Palestine stance of other BRICS founding members. 

Scholars of international order such as John Ikenberry have long argued that the American liberal hegemonic order may be in crisis, but not the liberal order itself as there is no grand alternative to it, and as American unipolarity fades and other powers emerge, there will appear new international leaders happy to engage with, and own, the liberal order.

All emerging and middle powers such as China, India, Brazil, Indonesia and Turkey, while wanting to imbue global governing institutions with what they consider their own national values and interests, have also engaged actively with the rules-based order, not rejected it. 

So the rules-based order won’t die from the wounds of Gaza even as its moral failure makes it more vulnerable than ever before to demands for change. But Gaza could well mark that moment of transition when it ceases to be the preserve of an America seen to be too partisan or too powerless to mediate the rules fairly.

The moment of transition that marks America’s passing as the dominant global power in the eyes of the rest of the world. Whatever form it takes after it emerges from Gaza’s rubble, the liberal order will not be America’s to wield any more. 

Debasish Roy Chowdhury is co-author of To Kill a Democracy: India’s Passage to Despotism.

Continue Reading

China is increasingly hostile to Israel

By:
On:
In: Asia

The war in Gaza, triggered by the atrocities committed by Hamas on Israel’s side of the border, has significant geopolitical ramifications for the rest of the world.

In times of crisis, Israel has an opportunity to see who its friends are. Many governments in the world, not necessarily Israel’s closest partners, responded to Hamas’ atrocities along the Gaza border by condemning the organization. China refrained from doing so, underscoring the fact that it is not a friend of Israel in the international arena. 

Moreover, it has led international calls for a humanitarian pause or a ceasefire, hindering the Israeli military attempt to vanquish Hamas and free kidnapped Israeli hostages. 

The Chinese President Xi Jinping called on Saturday for an immediate ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war. Facilitating the attainment of Hamas’ immediate aim of preventing Israeli military advances is not a friendly act. China supported the UN Security Council resolution on October 18 calling for a humanitarian pause in the fighting to allow aid into Gaza. Luckily for Israel, the United States vetoed it.

Beijing is trying to promote three key diplomatic aims: Bolstering its status as a champion of developing countries, the Palestinians being an example; enhancing its influence in the Middle East, and at the same time positioning itself as a superpower to rival the United States in a multipolar world, with some notable support.

Absurdly, China accused Israel of committing war crimes. Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Israeli counterpart, Eli Cohen, in a phone call that Israel needs to abide by international law and protect the safety of civilians (implying that Israel has not been). Wang denounced Israel for “going beyond self-defense” and called for an end to “collective punishment of the Gazan people.”

Chinese governmental statements mentioned that Israel’s retaliatory strikes went beyond what was acceptable under international humanitarian law, ignoring the great efforts by the Israeli army to spare civilians that were used by Hamas as a human shield in violation of international law. Hypocritically, China refrained in official statements from using the word “terror” when reporting or describing Hamas’ attacks, despite its long-standing formal opposition to terrorism.

Moreover, the Communist Party of China is encouraging anti-Semitic rhetoric in its state-controlled media. Chinese social media have seen a substantial increase in anti-Semitic pronouncements.

China is no longer free of prejudice against Jews. There seems to be evidence that citizens can even find themselves in trouble with the authorities for too vocally expressing support for Israel. Without any explanation, Israel’s name no longer appears on major online digital maps.

China’s insistence that the Israel-Hamas war be stopped as soon as possible is averse to Israel’s interest in having sufficient time to eradicate the terrorist organization Hamas in Gaza.

Beijing’s real motives

China pushes for a ceasefire because it does not want to see a wider, regional conflict.

President Xi was quoted by the state media as saying that a ceasefire was imperative as soon as possible to prevent the conflict from spiraling out of control. Such an expansion of hostilities could disrupt the global oil and gas supply chain, already strained by the Russia-Ukraine conflict. It also could derail the March 2023 Saudi-Iran reconciliation deal that China helped broker – a development China framed as indicative of a shifting global order. 

Yet Saudi Arabia and other moderate Arab states would like to see Hamas – an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood – defeated by Israel, while Iran supports Hamas.

Chinese support for Hamas is also related to the US efforts to coax a diplomatic normalization between Saudi Arabia and Israel, which have been disrupted by the armed conflict between Israel and Hamas. Formal diplomatic relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia would belittle the diplomatic success of the Chinese mediation between Tehran and Riyadh. 

Given the Chinese perception of a decreased US role in the Middle East and the Israel-Palestine conflict, the Gaza crisis is probably seen as an opportunity for China to expand its influence and emerge as a mediator. There are signs that the Chinese may want to get involved in brokering a peace deal between Hamas and Israel to help build their clout in the region. 

China probably realizes that the war in Gaza posits the American-led free world against Hamas, a proxy of Iran that is getting closer to Russia and China, rivals of the US. Moscow and Beijing have made a point of diverging from the Western-led support for Israel after the barbaric Hamas attack. China rightly perceives Israel as a democratic ally of the West, following in many ways the American preferences.

As much as China may appreciate access to Israeli technology, or see the economic opportunities in investing in Israel, Beijing’s heart and mind are with the adversaries of Israel and the US.

China also called for the convening of “a more authoritative, wide-ranging and effective” international peace summit as soon as possible to resume peace talks and formulate a timetable and roadmap to the establishment of a Palestinian state. The proposal, aired after a call between Wang and his counterpart from the Palestinian Authority, Riyad al-Maliki, is aimed at buttressing China’s international prestige.

Israel has always preferred bilateral negotiations and has been suspicious of multilateral fora. Moreover, Israel has rebuffed China’s efforts to present itself as an impartial broker. “When people are being murdered, slaughtered in the streets, this is not the time to call for a two-state solution,” was the response of a senior official at the Israeli Embassy in Beijing.  

It is high time for Israel to rethink its China policy, based on the clear-headed evaluation that China is increasingly adopting anti-Israeli positions.

Efraim Inbar is president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security and the head of the program on Strategy, Diplomacy, and Security at Shalem College. 

Continue Reading

How Bulgarian yogurt became a dietary sensation in Japan

By:
On:
In: Asia

Japan is currently swept up in a yogurt frenzy. Yogurt has become one of the trendiest and most sought-after foods in the country, enjoying a surge in popularity.

This rising demand for yogurt in Japan has given rise to a thriving market spearheaded by Meiji Holdings, a prominent Japanese company with a subsidiary specializing in dairy products and an evangelist of yogurt consumption in Japan. It stands as the foremost domestic producer in an industry valued at US$8.42 billion and growing rapidly.

However, yogurt hadn’t always sat so well on the Japanese palate.

The dairy item, particularly its renowned Bulgarian variety, was perceived poorly by the populace, who were put off by its supposedly unappealing look and smell that gave them an impression of it having gone rancid.

Meiji’s efforts to introduce the Balkan staple to the country seemed naive with bleak possibilities of adoption. However, the company managed to engineer its consumption in the gastronomically conservative country through clever marketing that focused on culturally pertinent value propositions.

The transformation of yogurt in Japan from an unfamiliar and often unpalatable substance just four decades ago to a daily dietary essential and a symbol of health and well-being is an intriguing tale.

When King Francis I of France fell ill with a stomach ailment, a renowned physician was summoned all the way from Constantinople. To everyone’s surprise, he arrived in Paris accompanied by an unusual entourage of about 40 sheep. This extraordinary doctor set to work, fermenting the milk from these sheep and offering it as a remedy.

Much to everyone’s amazement, the king made a rapid recovery. According to certain historical accounts, this intriguing incident marked the international debut of Bulgarian yogurt, celebrated for its medicinal properties, during the 16th century.

Yogurt consumption was already a well-established tradition in this region, particularly as a key component of the Mediterranean diet, known for its anti-aging effects. However, it was in 1905, in Geneva, when the 27-year-old Bulgarian-born microbiologist Stamen Grigorov conducted in-depth research on Bulgarian yogurt.

His findings revealed that the fermentation process was attributed to a specific rod-shaped bacterium, a particular subspecies of Lactobacillus delbrueckii, and Streptococcus thermophilus, another spherical bacterium. In acknowledgment of this discovery, the scientific community christened the former strain as Lactobacillus bulgaricus.

Around the same time, renowned Nobel Prize-winning Russian scientist Elie Metchnikoff, known as the father of cell-mediated immunity, introduced the theory that aging was linked to toxic bacteria in the gut. He singled out lactic-acid bacteria, especially L bulgaricus derived from home-made Bulgarian yogurt, for its capacity to neutralize toxins produced by such bacteria and thereby slow down the aging process.

Metchnikoff highly recommended daily consumption of this bacterium, proposing it as both a preventive and a curative for various conditions.

Subsequently, in the 1950s, Bulgaria patented a distinct blend of bacterial strains in an endeavor to promote what became known as “official Bulgarian yogurt.” Sold in simple mason jars, without any brand name or labels, it was referred to as kiselo mliako, or sour milk. For Bulgarians accustomed to incorporating yogurt into a multitude of dishes, such branding was unnecessary.

Bulgarian yogurt’s most significant international venture commenced in the 1970s when the Japanese company Meiji decided to utilize L bulgaricus in its products. Initially, Meiji’s Plain Yogurt met with some skepticism among consumers.

However, after numerous refinements, Meiji has now become the largest producer of Bulgarian yogurt in Japan, holding two-fifths of the yogurt market and distributing its products in such countries as Thailand, Singapore and China.

Bulgarian yogurt is known for its probiotic properties and potential health benefits, being viewed as a veritable superfood. It is often associated with promoting digestive health, slowing aging, and overall well-being, which has contributed to its popularity among health-conscious Japanese consumers.

Meiji played a significant role in popularizing Bulgarian yogurt. It not only introduced it but also imbued it with new meanings, images, and values, effectively branding it for Japanese consumers. 

Meiji’s advertising campaigns for its yogurt product celebrate its Bulgarian origins, portraying the Eastern European nation as the hallowed birthplace of yogurt. According to these campaigns, Bulgaria boasts an age-old tradition of dairy production, where the very air, water, and light differ from the rest of the world.

So, what inspired the Japanese Meiji Bulgaria Yogurt company, which commands more than 40% market share and boasts more than 99% brand awareness, to invest in this venture?

The journey began in the late 1960s when Meiji initiated efforts to develop Bulgarian-style yogurt tailored for the Japanese market. At the time, the sole yogurt available in Japan was a sweetened, heat-treated fermented milk with a gel-like texture, often consumed in little jars as a snack or dessert.

The concept of plain yogurt with live Lactobacillus bulgaricus, akin to what is commonly enjoyed in Bulgaria, was entirely foreign to the Far East. One member of Meiji’s Bulgaria yogurt project recalled the shock of trying plain yogurt at the Bulgarian pavilion during the 1970 World Fair in Osaka, describing it as peculiar and exceptionally tart. However, plain yogurt held an irresistible allure – the promise of extended longevity.

Meiji recognized that, from a technological standpoint, producing plain yogurt with live L bulgaricus wouldn’t be a formidable task. In 1971, the company launched this innovative product in Japan, simply naming it “Plain Yogurt.” Initial consumer reactions were unfavorable, with some interpreting its sourness as spoilage or doubting its edibility.

Nonetheless, Meiji persisted. In 1973, after an agreement with the Bulgarian state-owned dairy enterprise to import yogurt starter cultures, the company gained permission to rebrand its product as Meiji Bulgaria yogurt. The strategy was to emphasize authenticity, leveraging the Bulgarian countryside with its pastoral landscapes, herds of sheep and cows, traditional bagpipers, and the image of elderly individuals living in harmony with nature.

In the 1980s, Meiji combined this approach with additional microbiological research and closer collaboration with the Bulgarian side. By 1984, Japanese consumers were introduced to a new, sleeker packaging for Meiji Bulgaria yogurt, further solidifying its presence in the market.

Meiji received another boost when it secured the right to display the government-issued Food for Specified Health Use (FOSHU) seal on the label of its Bulgarian yogurt in 1996. Health benefits became the central focus of its yogurt branding and marketing. This communication culturally resonates with Japan, one of the world’s highest-longevity countries with a culture that places a strong emphasis on meticulous dietary planning to enhance youthfulness and well-being.

Japan has an extensive tradition of consuming fermented foods which are often ascribed vitality-boosting properties. Further, the Japanese generally place great emphasis on heritage, pristineness, ambient qualities, and habitat-essentialism in culinary choices, highly valuing traditional agricraft, local and organic sourcing, and natural and human environmental conditions of food origins.

By infusing its Bulgarian brand with fresh meanings, images, and values, Meiji has not only reaped significant profits but also crafted in Japan a captivating portrayal of Bulgaria as the ‘holy land of yogurt.’ 

Back in Bulgaria, the media are captivated by the widespread acclaim of Bulgarian yogurt produced in Japan. In a 2015 article, Japanese consumers asserted that Meiji’s Bulgarian yogurt surpassed the popularity of Coca-Cola.

Whether it’s in travelogues describing experiences in Japan or in economic reports, virtually every narrative surrounding Japan includes the remarkable success of Bulgarian yogurt. This compelling tale has been embraced by businesses and politicians in post-socialist Bulgaria as a means to evoke a sense of national pride.

For many Bulgarians, the newfound Japanese identity of their native yogurt encapsulates the essence of Bulgarian collective traditions. Simultaneously, they perceive a deeper connection to the contemporary world as it becomes a symbol of health and happiness in one of the world’s prominent economic superpowers.

While globalization has reshaped cultural values around the world, the economic and cultural transformation of yogurt in Japan has been a remarkable journey, turning it into a source of health and nourishment for the Japanese people and a balm for the Bulgarian national spirit.

Bulgarian yogurt remains a popular choice in Japan, being offered by various brands. It is commonly available in supermarkets and convenience stores across the island nation and its appeal continues to grow.

Educational campaigns highlighting its probiotic content and its Bulgarian heritage have helped raise awareness and drive its popularity. Many restaurants and cafes in Japan have started incorporating Bulgarian yogurt into their menus, using it as a base for various dishes, including breakfast bowls, parfaits, and savory dishes. This has helped introduce it to a broader audience.

Japan continues to exhibit a distinct preference for Bulgarian yogurt as a healthy snack. The once-foreign product has trickled even into rural and remote areas of the island nation. The cultural ferment of Bulgarian yogurt continues to fortify it in the country’s markets.

The author declares that he has no contact, interaction, sponsorship, or commercial ties with any businesses or organizations mentioned in the article.

Continue Reading

South Korean educators want to teach parents a lesson

By:
On:
In: Asia

In 2011, former president of the United States Barack Obama lauded the South Korean education system, where teachers are seen as “nation builders.” Inspired by the commendable commitment and quality of educators in South Korea, this praise captivated many within the country.

But a decade later, the landscape is vastly different. Thousands of schoolteachers have rallied against the South Korean government following the tragic death of a young teacher in July 2023. 

Having recently been appointed to a primary school in an affluent part of Seoul, the late teacher found herself ensnared in a distressing situation involving a parent accusing her of child abuse. Several teachers across the country have taken their own lives due to conflicts with students and their parents.

In the aftermath of these incidents, teachers across the nation united. Unlike past protests, which were often orchestrated by teacher associations or labor unions, these demonstrations saw many teachers voluntarily participate, share information and gather regularly. Their demands centered around enhanced protection at their workplaces. 

They called for amendments to the Child Welfare Act and the ability to discipline students without fear of facing child abuse accusations. About a month after the teacher’s death, the Ministry of Education released a set of legal amendment proposals to help alleviate teachers’ worries. 

The legislature is also swiftly enacting legal reforms to establish an improved foundation for teachers to educate their students with the confidence that they will be protected if any disputes arise.

In September 2023, the National Assembly unanimously passed legislative amendments that included provisions that restrict the dismissal of teachers without justifiable reasons if abuse allegations arise. It also included measures for parents who interfere with educational activities to receive special training, with fines imposed if they fail to comply. 

Still, teachers continue to demand more concrete measures for protection, such as the ability to file criminal charges against parents if their child abuse report results in acquittal.

But what matters more is looking at the underlying causes that drove South Korea’s “nation builders” to engage in this movement. This crisis has resulted from the long-standing clash between teachers’ rights to educate and discipline, students’ rights and parents’ rights to protect their children. In this dilemma, teachers have emerged worse off.

Over the last 15 years, there has been a decline in public confidence in the country’s education system and private education has become increasingly popular.

As parents seek to give their children an advantage within an already competitive education culture, education has been transformed into a commoditized service. Teachers have become service providers and are even subjected to ratings by students and parents. 

Parents who now typically raise only one or two children and as a result tend to overprotect their children, becoming extremely concerned if they believe their child has been unfairly treated by teachers.

Poor quality of teaching and unethical practices, particularly in public schools, in the past partially explain the decline in public confidence. 

The rapid increase in teacher numbers during the post-Korean War education boom led to an influx of unqualified instructors, some of whom engaged in abusive practices. The students who experienced this have now grown up to become parents.

Possibly as a result of these memories, the due respect that was once immediately afforded to teachers based on Confucian ideas, has lost its ground.

The end goal of education is typically admission to prestigious universities. In an increasingly stratified education system and a prestige-driven hierarchy of higher education, students and parents are tempted to downplay the importance of a holistic learning experience at primary and secondary levels. 

Amid this backdrop, teachers are increasingly seen not as educators but as graders, instrumentalized within a public education system geared towards university admission.

But because the government rushed to address the concerns of upset teachers, few of its proposals address these core issues or consider how to recover public trust in the education system.

To re-establish social trust, the government should formulate and implement a comprehensive consensus-building process and framework. Unlike other service-oriented sectors, education requires a longitudinal perspective, where the cultivation of knowledge and values is a gradual process. 

But South Korea has demonstrated a proclivity for frequent educational policy modifications, which often reflect the prevailing political inclinations, and this has contributed to diminished public confidence.

A more sustainable approach will require a re-evaluation of the pervasive culture of intense competition in the education system and a concerted effort to rekindle trust among educators, parents and students.

It is essential to recognize that education, particularly in East Asia, transcends the boundaries of formal contractual agreements formulated within legal or regulatory frameworks. 

The primary purpose of school education should not be solely to facilitate entry into prestigious universities – but this perspective warrants a significant shift in the collective consciousness of South Korean society.

Kyuseok Kim (Mick) and Eunyoung Shin are PhD students in the Department of Education at Korea University.

This article was originally published by East Asia Forum and is republished under a Creative Commons license.

Continue Reading

Don’t be fooled by Biden and Xi talks

By:
On:
In: Asia

There were smiles for the camera, handshakes, warm words and the unveiling of a couple of agreements.

But beyond the optics of the first meeting in over a year between the leaders of the world’s two biggest economies, not an awful lot had changed: There was nothing to suggest a “reset” in US and China relations that in recent years have been rooted in suspicion and competition.

President Joe Biden hinted as much just hours after the face-to-face talks, confirming that he still considered his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, a “dictator.” Beijing hit back, with foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning telling reporters Biden’s remark was “extremely wrong and irresponsible political manipulation.”

As a scholar of US-China relations, I believe the relationship between the two countries can be best described as an “enduring rivalry” – a term used by political scientists to denote two powers that have singled each other out for intense security competition. Examples from history include India and Pakistan, France and England, and the West and the Soviet Union.

Over the past two centuries, such rivals have accounted for only 1% of the world’s international relationships but 80% of its wars. History suggests these rivalries last around 40 years and end only when one side loses the ability to compete – or when the two sides ally against a common enemy.

Neither scenario looks likely any time soon in regards to China and the US.

How enduring rivalries end

China “is a communist country … based on a form of government totally different than ours,” Biden said after his meeting with Xi.

That comment gets to the heart of why diplomacy alone cannot reset the US-China relationship. Washington and Beijing are not rivals due to any misunderstanding that can be sorted out through talks alone.

US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping greet each other as they hold their first direct meeting in a year. Picture: YouTube Screengrab

Rather, they are rivals because of the opposite reason: They understand each other only too well and have come to the conclusion that their respective world outlooks cannot be reconciled.

The same is true for many of the issues that divide the two countries – they are framed as binary win-lose scenarios. Taiwan can be governed from Taipei or Beijing, but not both. Similarly, the East China and South China seas can be international waters or Chinese territory; Russia can be crippled or supported.

For the United States, its Asian alliances are a force for stability; for China, they’re hostile encirclement. And both countries are right in their respective assessments.

Diplomacy alone is insufficient to resolve a rivalry. At best, it can help manage it.

When the US calls, who picks up?

Part of this management of the US-China rivalry involves finding areas of agreement that can be committed to.

And on November 15, Biden and Xi announced deals over curbing China’s production of the deadly drug fentanyl and the restoring of high-level, military-to-military dialogue between the two countries.

But the fentanyl announcement is very similar to the one Xi gave to then-President Donald Trump in 2019. The US administration later accused China of reneging on the agreement.

Similarly, committing to restarting high-level dialogue is one thing; following up on it is another. History is dotted with occasions when having an open line between Beijing and Washington hasn’t meant a whole lot in times of crisis.

In 2001, when a US surveillance aircraft collided with a Chinese jet over Hainan Island, Beijing didn’t pick up the phone. Likewise, during the Tiananmen Square massacre, then-President George H W Bush urgently tried to call his counterpart Deng Xiaoping but was unable to get through.

Moreover, focusing on what was agreed to in talks also highlights what wasn’t – and is unlikely to ever be – agreed to without a substantial shift in power that forces one side to concede to the other.

For example, China wants the US to stop selling arms to Taiwan. But Washington has no intention of doing this, as it knows that this will make the disputed island more vulnerable to Beijing. Washington would like China to end its military displays of strength over the Taiwan Strait; Beijing knows doing so risks seeing Taiwan drift toward independence.

American policymakers have long said what they want is China to “change” – by which it means to liberalize its system of governance. But the Chinese Communist Party knows that doing so means self-liquidation – every communist regime that has allowed space for alternative political parties has unraveled.

Which is why American attempts to engage China are often met with suspicion in China. As former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin commented, engagement and containment policies have the same aim: to end China’s socialist system.

For similar reasons, Xi has shunned attempts by the US to bring China further into the rules-based international order. The Chinese leader saw what happened when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev tried to integrate the Soviet Union into the Western order in the late 1980s – it only hastened the demise of the socialist entity.

Instead, Xi calls for a massive military buildup, the reassertion of Chinese Communist Party control and an economic policy based on self-reliance.

Actions speak louder …

The encouraging words and limited agreements hammered out in the latest meeting between Xi and Biden should also not distract from the actions that continue to push the US and China further apart.

China’s show of force in the Taiwan Strait has been sustained for three years now and shows no sign of abating. Meanwhile, Beijing’s navy continues to harass other nations in the South China Sea.

Similarly, Biden has continued the US path toward military alliances aimed at countering China’s threat. It recently entered a trilateral agreement between the US, Japan and South Korea. And that came two years after the establishment of AUKUS, a security partnership between the US, Australia and the UK that has similar aims.

The AUKUS nuclear submarine deal is making ripples across the Indo-Pacific. Image: US Embassy in China

Meanwhile, the US administration will continue to tighten the screws on China’s economy through investment restrictions. Biden is well aware that easy-flowing money from Wall Street is helping China weather choppier economic waters of late and is keen to turn off the tap.

The point of diplomacy

This isn’t to say that diplomacy and face-to-face talks are pointless. They do, in fact, serve a number of interests.

For both men involved, there is a domestic upside. For Biden, playing nice with China projects the image of a statesman – especially at a time when, due to US positions on Ukraine and the Middle East, he is facing accusations from the political left of being a “warmonger.”

And encouraging Beijing to tread softly during the US election year may blunt a potential line of attack from Republicans that the administration’s China policy is not working.

Meanwhile, Xi is able to showcase his own diplomatic skills and present China as an alternative superpower to the US and to potentially cleave the Western business community – and perhaps even major European nations – from what he would see as the US anti-China coalition.

Moreover, summits like the one in San Francisco signal that both the US and China are jointly committed to at least keep talking, helping ensure that a rocky relationship doesn’t descend into anything more belligerent – even if that doesn’t make them any friendlier.

Michael Beckley is Associate Professor of Political Science, Tufts University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Continue Reading