Commentary: Everything costs more, so why is Japan making beer cheaper?

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REASON FOR CHEER

The authorities decided it was done in 2017. It decided to combine the income bands of real beer, happoshu, and third beer into one after beer income had decreased by 30 % from a 1994 top. This three-stage process will be finished in 2026.

Happoshu and next beers range in quality from ordinary to awful, which is reason to celebrate. They could have happened to you while playing karaoke( the painful head is a giveaway), or you might have only been terrible enough to pick one up off the convenience store shelf.

I switched to Clear Asahi, a” next form” alternate made with fermented barley, when money was tight. You eventually convince yourself that you hardly notice the difference.

I was fortunate enough to be able to return to authentic beer after receiving a boost at my previous job. Perhaps that Clear Asahi you will now cost roughly 10 renminbi more this month. A brewers’ organization polled nearly 25 % of respondents last year, and they predict they’ll consume more real ale once the changes take effect.

Do most users, however, have the luxury of making more purchases? Even though the taxes on real ale will drop from 77 hankering before 2020 to almost 55 by 2026, it is still half as much as the 28 Yen levied on a can of third beer prior to the changes, which is worrying the central bank.

Over the past three years, alcohol consumption is far from the only segment of society that has succumbed to cutting corners and making the wrong investments. However, Japan has reached a turning point. Despite the backlash against former Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda’s remarks last year, businesses have suddenly begun to accept the idea of passing on expenses, and consumers appear to be adjusting to higher prices.

Give rates increased significantly earlier this year, and in October the minimum wage was raised to an average of 1, 000 renminbi, the largest increase since data started. In addition, & nbsp,

However, it’s not entirely clear if this is a long-lasting shift or merely an adjustment. The need for additional wage increases next spring may be lessened by the fact that inflation is already declining. Yet cash-rich businesses will be forced to wait by the impending possibility of a US recession.

Pay may be less important than retirement for the time being due to the rise of the” serious curious” children who consume less alcohol than previous years.

The brewers argue that the current price is 14 times higher in Germany than it is in the US, which is why they are calling for additional cuts to the beer tax. In a country where the topic of discussion right now is how to finance optimistic defense and child-rearing programs, that seems unlikely to carry much weight.

Japan needs to invest its resources in the correct places and get rid of the kinds of negative subsidies that contributed to happiness. It would be something to raise a glass to if these changes could help jolt the government out of its multi-decade economizing mood.

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Commentary: Malaysia PM Anwar’s reform credentials on the line in possible Cabinet reshuffle

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ANWAR’S BALANCING ACT

What is often not recognised is that Mr Anwar’s options may be limited.

First, he will have to decide if he wants a mini reshuffle, replacing new ministers in key portfolios and keeping the rest intact, or a major reshuffle where changes are not only made to the Cabinet, but also to the top layer of the civil service, government-linked companies and key statutory bodies.

Second, and this is the tricky bit, Mr Anwar will have to “balance” the representation in Cabinet. After a decades-long wait for the prime ministership, Mr Anwar was finally sworn into power on Nov 24 last year. There were many twists and turns, but a Pakatan Harapan (PH)-led ruling coalition finally came together comprising previous ruling coalition Barisan Nasional, Gabungan Parti Sarawak, Gabungan Rakyat Sabah and Parti Warisan.

Each party in his unity government must get their share or it will lead to political instability. There is already unhappiness among the Chinese that PH component party Democratic Action Party, with the largest number of seats in Parliament on the government side, is under-represented. UMNO and the East Malaysians, on the other hand, are over-represented.

On top of that, Mr Anwar must consider the status of those he wishes to appoint. Obviously, they must hold senior positions in their respective parties or have some special skill set.

Mr Anwar must also carve up the work in “overlap” areas to avoid perceptions of conflict. For example, sections of the business community are not happy with the way the Ministry of Economy under Rafizi Ramli and the Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry under Tengku Zafrul Aziz are creating additional red tape and approvals because two ministries are involved.

Many in the business community would prefer the Economy Ministry, which was first established in 2018, to be scrapped and its core functions returned to the finance ministry.

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Commentary: Shooting of police inspector at dinner party exposes corruption underbelly in Thai police

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POLICE REFORM A PIPE DREAM

Little has changed since Thai economist Pasuk Phongpaichit’s iconic book Guns, Girls, Gambling, Ganja on police graft 25 years ago. The book examined how gambling, prostitution, drugs, arms trading, oil smuggling and human trafficking funded Thailand’s corrosive “money politics” and sustained corruption in the police.

In 2018, the police topped the list of defendants in corruption and malfeasance cases heard in graft court.

Last month, a National Anti-Corruption Commission report revealed that 86 per cent of police stations nationwide failed integrity and transparency tests – four times higher than the average across all state agencies.

And in a nationwide survey earlier this month, 86 per cent of respondents said they believe some police and state officials serve and protect mafia-style influential figures in Thailand.

In response to the killing of the inspector, Thailand’s new Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin promised that he would purge the force of “mafia-type infiltration”.

But the government’s response so far suggests it is not serious about eliminating police criminality, focusing instead on compiling a list of “mafia-like gangs and politicians”.

Pheu Thai and its precursor parties have, collectively, been in power for more than nine years – ample time to have acted on corruption in the police, if they had wished.

Ex-premier (and former police lieutenant colonel) Thaksin Shinawatra – widely held to be Pheu Thai’s real leader – is unlikely to help. During his three-month “war on drugs” in 2003, 2,873 Thais were killed, including whole families, women, children and old people. According to the US State Department, Thaksin “told the governors and provincial police that those who failed to eliminate a prescribed percentage of the names from their “blacklists”, would be fired.

Nor will Thaksin’s erstwhile political opponents – now key coalition allies. When in power, they dallied in enacting laws on police administration. It was only after the 2021 murder of a suspect at police hands that they rushed through a police ethics code requiring officers not to associate with, or support, wrongdoers – which has only too obviously proved ineffective.

It’s hard to see how Thailand’s new administration will clean up the police. It is not a priority for Srettha’s Pheu Thai Party.

Instead, Pheu Thai is prioritising policies to regain some of the support it lost by breaking a pre-election promise not to coalesce with parties backed by the 2014 junta leaders. Its stimulus policies, such as debt moratoriums and a 10,000 baht cash handout to those aged 16 and over will likely resonate with many of the party’s poorer rural backers.

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Commentary: Will ASEAN’s first joint military exercise prepare it for future crises?

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A SIGNAL TO MAJOR POWERS

What objective does the ASEAN Solidarity Exercise 2023 serve?

First, the exercise could be interpreted as a signal to major powers that ASEAN has a stake in the security of regional waters and the agency to secure them. Given the tension between China and the United States, there have been concerns among ASEAN defence officials that any China-US military conflict will affect regional waters.

In addition, the exercise was held at a time of increasing Chinese assertiveness in the South China Sea, from harassing several ASEAN members’ maritime activities within their exclusive economic zones to releasing a new map claiming nearly the entire South China Sea as its own.

In fact, the initial exercise location in the South China Sea suggests a signal by Indonesia to China that the latter’s claim to the entire South China Sea is contested.

Second, the exercise enabled ASEAN military forces to build trust with each other without the involvement of external forces. Trust leads to better communication, critical if ASEAN needs to harness the region’s military forces to deal quickly with a major crisis.

Currently, there are several regional multilateral arrangements to enhance maritime security. These include coordinated patrols between Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines to deal with security issues in the Sulu Sea, and the Malacca Straits Patrol Framework involving Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand to ensure the security of the Straits of Malacca and Singapore.

But these are limited to specific geographical parts of the region and do not involve all ASEAN members.

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Commentary: Indonesia needs soft power to advance its global clout

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Japan, South Korea, Singapore, even Thailand have fared much better than Indonesia in this respect. In the Global Soft Power Index 2023, they all sit above Indonesia, which sits in 45th place. Much remains to be learnt about how these countries manage their soft power potential.

Take neighbouring Thailand, for example. Through government-led gastro-diplomacy initiatives, the country has successfully boosted the presence of Thai restaurants overseas from around 5,000 in the early 2000s to 15,000 by 2018, according to one study.

A recent report by the Pew Research Center shows that Thai restaurants make up 11 per cent of all Asian restaurants in the United States – the third most common after Chinese and Japanese. Export of Thai agricultural products and tourism have increased accordingly. These have helped boost Thailand’s cultural influence.

PARADIGM SHIFT NEEDED

To incorporate soft power into Indonesia’s geostrategic projection, a change of paradigm by its policymakers is a necessity. A conventional paradigm conceives Indonesia’s main source of strength as lying in numbers: Population, natural resources, or territory. Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto exemplifies such a view – as evident in his most recent book Paradoks Indonesia.

Mainstreaming soft power as a policy paradigm requires Indonesian policymakers to start seeing its pristine nature, biodiversity, culture and human talent as the primary capital of geostrategic influence.

Learning from Thailand’s experience, for instance, Indonesia should design a comprehensive policy to help its culinary heritage go global. Such policy would reinforce existing initiatives by civil society actors and the Indonesian diaspora to promote Indonesian culinary heritage (like tempeh) abroad and provide incentives for those wishing to partake in such endeavours.

While Indonesia has recently launched the Indonesia Spice Up The World programme to help promote local food and restaurants abroad, it remains to be seen whether it will end up merely as a slogan or fall prey to sectoral egos among the agencies involved, for which the Indonesian government is infamous.

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Commentary: Why the next decade is not simply about getting rich for Indonesia

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As a country’s population ages, economic growth starts to decline. The rate and the extent of the decline will depend on the foundation that the earlier, younger high-growth economy was able to lay, including for human capital, physical infrastructure and governance.

Although an imploding working age population may be attenuated by a higher labour force participation rate, especially of elder workers (that is, those aged 65 or above), on average, older workers are not as productive and innovative as younger ones. This usually translates to lower labour productivity growth and a slower rate of innovation.

The natural growth rate of a country’s economy, which is the rate of economic growth that could be sustained over the long term and is determined by demographic changes and technical progress, will also decline. This results in a lower appetite for corporate investment and consequently, lower firm productivity.

GET DEVELOPMENT ON TRACK, THEN GET RICH

What seems to be preoccupying policymakers now is how to “get rich before getting old”, as touted in the Grand Strategy for Indonesia’s 2045 Vision. This mindset must change: Indonesia should close its development gap by getting its foundations right, then get rich, not vice versa. The sequence of reforms matters.

President Joko Widodo, popularly known as Jokowi, in his two terms has made tremendous progress in building certain structural foundations for the country – including in transportation, electricity generation, irrigation systems, regulatory reforms aiding investment, the financial and health sectors, and tax harmonisation.

This is his legacy in improving the welfare of Indonesians. However, there are big development gaps that Indonesia’s next president still needs to close in the next critical 10 to 15 years, primarily laggard human capital and the eroding quality of governance.

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Commentary: Malaysia opposition party PAS needs more than a Mahathir

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In a speech delivered in Terengganu, Abdul Hadi had declared PAS’ struggle as jihad (holy war), and criticised UMNO for upholding a colonial Constitution, laws of unbelievers and pre-Islamic legislation. Conversely, PAS leaders were upset with Mahathir’s government for not uplifting the poorer east coast states of Kelantan and Terengganu. PAS deemed UMNO to be secular.

As recently as 2019, Mahathir requested that PAS withdraw from Amanat Haji Hadi.

BURYING THE HATCHET

Now Mahathir and Abdul Hadi (and PAS) appear to have buried the hatchet, for political reasons.

On the one hand, Mahathir has joined the PAS bandwagon to revive his statesman image. As the father of Malaysia’s industrialisation, and the man who turned the country into an Asian Tiger economy in the 1990s, Mahathir does not want to end up in Malaysia’s annals of history as a downed political juggernaut.

At 97, Mahathir continues to garner respect from the international community, particularly in Japan and South Korea, and is regularly invited to speak at international forums. Moreover, the Islamic world remembers Mahathir for speaking up for the Muslims during the Bosnian war and the Palestinian issue.

It is on the domestic front that respect for him has waned significantly. With PAS’ strong electoral performance in the recent general and state elections, Mahathir is now trying to be on the winning side again, easing the memories of his 2022 defeat.

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Commentary: The fraught history of India and the Khalistan movement

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Campaigners FROM KHALISTAN WERE KILLED

The death of Nijjar marks the second intentional killing of Khalistan leaders outside of India.

Head of the Khalistan Commando Force Paramjit Singh Panjwar was killed in May in Lahore, Pakistan, by two identified attackers. Avtar Singh Khanda of the Khalistan Liberation Force, based in the UK, was accused of intoxication to death in June.

Nijjar served as both the leader of the Khalistan Tiger Force and an active member of Sikhs for Justice, a team based in the United States that is working to establish an independent state of Sikhism. Sikhs for Justice have been holding elections in support of Khalistan since 2022 in Canada and other countries.

According to Punjabi intelligence officers, Nijjar had assumed control of the Khalistan Tiger Force as the” operational head” and was assembling teams to launch attacks, The Times of India reported in 2016.

Additionally, it asserted that Nijjar often traveled to Pakistan and interacted with Pakistani intelligence. Additionally, there have been claims that Nijjar was preparing an invasion in Punjab by operating a tent close to Mission, British Columbia.

That document, according to Mission Mayor Randy Hawes, is unreliable. When asked if that claim had any merit, Canada’s public health minister, Ralph Goodale, declined to respond at the time.

Nijjar noted in an open letter to Trudeau that the accusations made against him were” technically false and falsified.” ” I believe that I have become the target of an Indian government media campaign to label my human rights campaign as” terrorism activities” because of my campaign for Sikh rights ,” he continued.

The most recent event in the ongoing dispute between India and Canada regarding the Khalistan activity is the Nijjar episode. The American government asserts that India’s independence, territorial integrity, and security are in jeopardy because Canada hasn’t outlawed organizations like the Khalistan Tiger Force and Sikhs for Justice.

Canada has so far steadfastly refused to halt the elections. In the meantime, India’s latest Indian populist government is still intolerant of any dissenting opinions, particularly those from minority groups.

At the University of Victoria, Reeta Tremblay teaches social science. The Conversation was where this remark second appeared.

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Commentary: Why is Beijing sensitive about clothes that ‘hurt the feelings of the Chinese nation’?

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In addition to the fact that the law may incite political sentiments in some segments of the Taiwanese populace, it may also foster social interactions that are not conducive to cross-cultural and people-to-people interactions.

In addition to China’s delayed post-pandemic opening, spectators observe a significant decline in the number of foreign visitors to the country, which may be partially attributed to worsening ties with the West. In late June, the US State Department advised Americans to” evaluate journey( to China ) due to arbitrary enforcement of local regulations, including in relation to leave restrictions and the risk of unlawful detentions.”

Beijing would do well to prevent local politics at its water’s advantage as much as possible at a time when Beijing is pushing for cross-cultural exchanges worldwide. In fact, China has recently demonstrated a willingness to restrain its” dog warrior” approach to foreign policy, as evidenced by the dismissal of Mr. Zhao Lijian as the Chinese foreign ministry’s official. One of the West’s most vocal detractors was Zhao.

PUBLIC SECURITY REFORMS TIMING

More than ten years ago, on January 1, 2013, Beijing implemented its final revision to the public safety rules. Although the precise motivations behind Beijing’s recent push for new laws are inevitably unknown, it comes at a time when China is struggling with slow economic growth and alarmingly high youth unemployment. Nationalism and monetary expansion are two of the most closely scrutinized pillars that support the authenticity of China’s Communist Party regime.

The schedule of the proposed law seems to indicate an effort to strengthen the group’s reputation as a fervent supporter of Chinese regional satisfaction as progress is sluggish. However, the government’s arduous efforts to draw in and keep international investments in China may be undermined by the rise of political sentiment, which could worsen the economic difficulties of the nation.

The suggested improvements criminalize offensive clothing as well as icons and remarks. If you look at it more closely, the proposed laws reflect the direction of local politics in China in a new century, where the celebration is positioned as the driving force behind the country’s revival.

It is still unclear whether Chinese legislators may ultimately pass the law or make additional amendments to clarify the proposed additions given the lengthy open debate and the foreign stakes involved.

Li Mingjiang is an Associate Professor and Provost’s Chair in International Relations at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, NTU, and Tiong Wei Jie is a PhD candidate in foreign connections.

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Commentary: Rice export bans and price caps are a food crisis risk for Asia

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RICE RISING Quick Need

Sadly, the lessons learned from the rice price spike between 2007 and 2008 — when the grain cost more than tripled and then quickly rose to above$ 2,000 per tonne( USD )— have not been taken into account. Then & nbsp, export restrictions, price caps, and hoarding created a difficult and tragic situation. Asia today runs the same risk of outcome.

Asian countries andnbsp clearly need to guard their vulnerable populations from sharp increases in food costs, but they also have more complex tools at their disposal than common export restrictions and one-size-fits-all price caps. Targeted assistance, such as through robust security safety nets, is more effective and much less expensive. In addition, & nbsp,

Current issues with The & nbsp highlight the need to support increased rice production. The good news is that Eastern governments have learned a number of lessons from the food crisis that lasted from 2007 to 2008, as well as from stepping up support for their producers. Since therefore, production has posted records nearly every year.

Yet in 2023, production and nbsp are predicted to reach an all-time high due to droughts linked to El Nino. The bad news is that demand is increasing even more quickly as a result of Asia and Africa’s declining severe poverty and booming people growth.

Institutions require production even more in order to keep up. Andnbsp, That’s challenging in a time of climate change when everyone is attempting to cut back on fertilizer and water usage.

One choice is to make additional investments in better grains, including physically modified ones. China has long opposed genetically modified organisms, but now it is opening the door, beginning with wheat.

To prevent crop losses after harvest, another option is to enhance & nbsp, farming infrastructure, including silos. Regional development banks could do much more to channel money in the latter & nbsp area. & nbsp,

Asia needs to adopt the curve and allow free markets to operate more than attempting to stretch the supply and demand diagrams. Magno has returned to & nbsp and is currently teaching a course on public economics. All we can hope for is that some officers and nbsp visit her course. & nbsp,

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