Heightened safety period to end but new measures introduced to improve workplace safety

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Singapore’s workplace fatality rate per 100,000 workers has fallen to 0.8 since the measures were imposed, down from 1.5 for January to August 2022, MOM said in a press release.

The MOM’s Workplace Safety and Health (WSH) target for 2028 is to keep the fatality rate below 1.

“The (heightened safety period) has served its purpose as an urgent call on employers to prioritise safety and bring down workplace fatalities,” it said.

However, the ministry noted that the major injuries rate per 100,000 workers worsened to 19.2, from 16.8 previously. The improvement in safety was also uneven across different industries.

Construction showed the most improvement, though it remains the top contributor to the absolute number of fatal and major injuries. The fatal and major injury rate in the manufacturing sector worsened to 39.3 during the heightened safety period, higher than the construction industry’s rate of 34.5.

“This indicates the need for more sector-specific intervention to improve workplace safety outcomes,” MOM wrote.Mr

Mr Zaqy Mohamad, Senior Minister of State for Manpower, also expressed concern at the major injuries rate. But he ruled out extending the heightened safety period indefinitely. 

“It relies primarily on tougher enforcements and penalties, and is not a sustainable approach,” he said. “As we exit HSP (heightened safety period), we need to recognise that it takes the collective will, responsibility and effort of the entire ecosystem to keep our workers safe and healthy.”

NEW SAFETY MEASURES

To strengthen ownership of WSH “fundamentally and sustainably”, the multi-agency workplace safety taskforce will be retaining some measures from the heightened safety period and implementing new requirements.

The demerit points system for WSH breaches in the construction sector will be expanded to the manufacturing sector from October this year. Companies that accumulate 25 demerit points or more for WSH infringements within an 18-month period will be temporarily barred from employing foreign employees.

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More Singapore companies looking to meet Central Asia’s growing consumer demand

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GROWING CONSUMER DEMAND

“I think it’s still a region that not many people think of straight away. Many Singapore companies, naturally, will still think of countries in the nearby regions, and rightfully so because these are familiar regions and these are also growth regions, especially South Asia,” said Mr Clarence Hoe, executive director for Americas and Europe at EnterpriseSG. 

“But this is where Enterprise Singapore comes in. We really look at finding the new areas which are growing, identify them and share them with our companies. And this helps to provide new markets, not just as a growth opportunity, but also as a market for diversification.”

Kazakhstan, one of the largest economies in Central Asia, is Singapore’s largest trading partner in the region, with more than 30 Singapore companies in the country. There are also over 20 firms operating in neighbouring Uzbekistan. 

EnterpriseSG said it is organising seminars and trade missions for Singapore firms to connect and collaborate with partners in Central Asia, as part of efforts to help more local firms expand and enhance their supply chain resilience. 

EFFORTS PAYING OFF

Some businesses that have expanded into Central Asia told CNA that their efforts are paying off.

Among them is Singapore-listed food manufacturing and distribution company Food Empire, which saw an opportunity nearly 30 years ago. 

Today, the company’s coffee products can be found in stores and supermarkets across Kazakhstan. 

“Our business has been growing year upon year,” said Mr Anil Bhuwania, business head of Central Asia at Food Empire. 

“Over the last four years, in terms of volume, our market share has grown from 67 per cent to 73 per cent (for) coffee mixes.”

The company is now looking to add tea products into the mix, especially tea with milk.

However, logistics and transportation remain a challenge.

“We need to find alternative routes, either via China or sometimes via Georgia, and see how the goods can be transported into Kazakhstan because it’s a landlocked country,” said Mr Bhuwania.

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With Micron ban, China says no to ‘de-risking’

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US chip maker Micron Technology has become the first Western firm sanctioned by China after G7 countries vowed to de-risk from the world’s manufacturing hub.

China’s key national infrastructure operators are now forbidden to purchase products from Micron because the company poses network security risk, said the Cybersecurity Review Office, a unit of the Cyberspace Administration of China.
 
Mao Ning, a spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said Monday that the investigation of Micron’s products is necessary as it is aimed at preventing China’s telecom infrastructure from facing cybersecurity risks.
 
The US Commerce Department said China’s accusations against Micron have no basis in fact. It said it will engage directly with China to resolve restrictions on Micron chip deliveries.

“We also will engage with key allies and partners to ensure we are closely coordinated to address distortions of the memory chip market caused by China’s actions,” the department said. “This action, along with recent raids and targeting of other American firms, is inconsistent with the People’s Republic of China (PRC)’s assertions that it is opening its markets and is committed to a transparent regulatory framework.”

The US had asked South Korea to urge its chipmakers not to fill any market gap in China if Micron products were banned in the Chinese markets, according to a Financial Times report published April 24.

Jang Young-jin, South Korea’s vice minister of trade, said Monday that Samsung and SK Hynix will make a judgment on whether they should do as the US requested.

Micron said it is evaluating the conclusion made by the Cyberspace Administration and assessing its next steps.

Re-invest or leave

An article titled “Micron has done all the bad things! Now it is finally sanctioned” was widely circulated on the Internet in China on Monday, explaining the logic behind Beijing’s curbs. 

“In January 2022, when the US government pushed forward its plan to de-couple from China, Micron said it would stop cooperating with China, sack its staff and close its Shanghai-based DRAM design center,” the writer says. “It also provided skilled worker visas to more than 40 senior technicians and migrated its businesses from China to India and the US.”

‘Kill the chicken to scare the monkeys’ is an old Chinese saying. Micron has been selected for the chicken role in this phase of the chips war. Image: screenshot

The writer continues, “In the China-US chip war, Micron has always been actively playing the role of a vanguard of the US. The company makes money in the Chinese market while replying to the United States’ power to suppress Chinese chip firms. It has done all the bad things!”

He concludes, “What do we only sanction Micron but not Samsung and SK Hynix? They all make money in China but Micron does not increase its investment in the country while Samsung and SK Hynix keep re-investing.”

Media reports said last month that US President Joe Biden was set to sign an executive order that would restrict US companies and private equity and venture capital funds from investing in China’s microchips, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, biotechnology and clean energy projects and firms.

Biden had planned to announce these investment curbs before the G7 Summit, which was held in Hiroshima between last Friday and Sunday, but he has not unveiled them so far.

De-risking from China

G7 leaders said in a joint statement on Saturday that they have a common interest in preventing a narrow set of technological advances from being used by some countries to enhance their military and intelligence capabilities to undermine international peace and security. 

“A growing China that plays by international rules would be of global interest. We are not decoupling or turning inward,” they said. “At the same time, we recognize that economic resilience requires de-risking and diversifying.”

“We will continue to ensure that the clearly defined, narrow set of sensitive technologies that are crucial for national security or could threaten international peace and security are appropriately controlled, without unduly impacting broader trade in technology,” said G7 leaders. “We will enhance resilient supply chains through partnerships around the world, especially for critical goods such as critical minerals, semiconductors and batteries.”

This statement also set off the Chinese punditocracy. “G7 has become an important tool for the US to contain and suppress China,” a Hebei-based writer says in an article. Washington “is now promoting deglobalization by using subsidies and coercion to attract semiconductor firms to set up factories in the US.”

He adds, “Now the US gets what it wants as China is saying ‘no’ to US memory chip makers. Micron tried to expand in China and benefit from the US sanctions against Chinese chip firms. But it has shot itself in the foot.”

Supply shock?

Last year, Micron’s revenue from China amounted to $3.3 billion, about 11% of the company’s total revenue. The figure more than tripled from $5.3 billion in 2016 to $17.4 billion in 2018 but it started to decline after Micron had legal disputes with Chinese firms.

As early as March 31, the Cyberspace Admnistration had said it was looking into Micron’s products sold in China but it was not until Sunday evening that it announced the Micron ban.

An unnamed analyst was quoted by the National Business Daily as having said on Monday that Chinese memory chip makers, including GigaDevice, Yangtze Memory Technologies Corp (YMTC), ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT), Dongxin Co. Ltd and Ingenue Semiconductor, will benefit as they can grab Micron’s market share in China. 

A YMTC worker examines a semiconductor wafer. Photo: YMTC

He said that during the transition, China will not face a memory chip shortage as there is enough inventory in the markets.

YMTC, the main Chinese competitor to Micron, is developing its own supply chain by using Chinese-only equipment, the South China Morning Post reported on April 23. The company has placed orders with domestic tool suppliers, including Beijing-based Naura Technology, after receiving new funding from its state-backed investors.

However, Liu Pei-chen, a researcher at the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research, warned that China may face a memory chip shortage if suppliers in South Korea, Japan and Taiwan limit their exports to the country upon the US’s request.

Liu said China still relies heavily on the import of foreign memory chips as YMTC and CXMT have limited production capacities. She said the US may have a say in whether suppliers in South Korea, Japan and Taiwan should take up Micron’s market share in China. 

Read: Micron probe by China seen as chip war retaliation

Follow Jeff Pao on Twitter at @jeffpao3

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How Russia might rethink its China alliance after Putin

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For more than three decades, Moscow and Beijing have been incrementally strengthening their partnership. The growing number of potentially conflicting interests, for instance over investment and exploration in the Arctic, have not slowed down cooperation.

Despite Russia becoming China’s “junior partner” over the last decade as Beijing’s economic and global strength has grown, their relationship remains strong. Pushing back against US power is a continual driver for both nations.

But if Russian president Vladimir Putin was no longer in a leadership role would the relationship unravel? A change of leadership in Moscow is likely to complicate Russian-Chinese cooperation, but not due to ideological shifts in Russian politics or geopolitical realignments on the global scene.

The prospects for Russia’s democratization or improvement in relations with the West are the bleakest in the last two decades. It is Russian domestic politics that is most likely to play a significant role in affecting the direction of the future relationship of the two countries.

Any change in the Kremlin is likely to upset a delicate balance in Russia’s political and economic ecosystem and would lead to a new round of internal struggles for influence and resources.

While deepening cooperation with Beijing, Moscow has signed a number of agreements, which were sub-optimal from the perspective of the Russian state but which strengthened the positions of Putin’s allies and associates.

In return, they created a powerful pro-Chinese lobby in the corridors of the Kremlin. Without Putin’s patronage, these business empires could be targeted by those surrounding a new leader, if they wanted to move into having more diverse business partners abroad.

The Kremlin. Photo: Shutterstock via The Conversation

What’s more, those Russians who have supported ever-closer cooperation with China cannot be taken for granted. If China decided to employ wolf-warrior diplomacy (a confrontational technique that pushes back against criticism of the Beijing government) in Russia it could alienate those who were previously allies.

Some Russian scholars warned of this even before the war in Ukraine. An escalation of Chinese cyber, industrial and traditional espionage practices – a temptation that may be irresistible for a stronger partner – would push Russian intelligence services to crack down on Chinese technology with possible surveillance capabilities.

A new leader would have an opportunity to reassess the degree of Russia’s dependence on China and the broader context of Russian policy in Asia. It is worth remembering that already in the mid-2000s, Russia was trying to make a “turn to the East”, not a turn to China.

Russia’s Asian policy was to be balanced and diversified, focused on cooperation with China, Japan, Korean states and Southeast Asian countries. Oil and gas pipelines were meant to serve Asian customers, not just China.

Meanwhile, China has been buying the lion’s share of the oil sent to Russia’s Asian terminal in Kozmino. The Power of Siberia gas pipeline and its potential second branch go only to China and thus make it impossible for Russia to start exporting gas directly to other customers such as South Korea.

The participation of Russian aircraft and ships in joint patrols around Japan is beneficial to Beijing, but it limits Moscow’s room for manuever to forge other Asian allies and makes it dependent on Chinese policy.

Domestic opinion

Domestic politics in Russia has created favorable conditions for close cooperation with China. But regime survival considerations affect the Kremlin’s assessment of China’s growing power and lead it to neglect the growing asymmetry in relations with Beijing.

The Russian elite does not see China as a threat to the security and survival of the regime. Therefore, it is easier for Moscow to interpret China’s rise to a superpower as friendly and to accept its growing global role, even if it makes Russia a less significant partner.

A graphic showing exports from Russia to China
Image: OEC via The Conversation

The financial and political benefits gained from the partnership by individual members of the Russian elite have been another driver for the relationship with Beijing. Not everyone is as enthusiastic about cooperation as Igor Sechin, head of state-owned oil firm Rosneft, for whom China is the most important partner.

However, even those companies that compete with their Chinese counterparts, such as Russia’s state nuclear energy corporation Rosatom, still benefit from having a presence on the Chinese market.

Without a doubt, a new Russian leader’s hands would be tied to a large extent. Oil and gas pipelines leading to China connect Russian companies with this market and cannot be replaced easily. The selective support offered by China has consolidated the pro-Beijing orientation of the key players in Russia.

Even before the war in Ukraine, Beijing helped some companies circumvent the barriers from Western sanctions by offering prepayments for oil deliveries or providing loans. A large part of the Russian elite sees China as the only partner against the West.

Nevertheless, any new leader will have an opportunity to re-evaluate the costs and benefits of close ties with Beijing, and it will be in their interest to do so if it can strengthen its hand.

Marcin Kaczmarski is Lecturer in Security Studies, University of Glasgow

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

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Chinese, not Korean chipmakers will benefit from Micron ban

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China’s Micron ban will benefit Chinese memory chip makers, not Korea: Hynix shares rose modestly overnight while Micron shares fell about 6% after China’s Cyperspace regulators declared the Micron product unsafe. But Korean analysts don’t think this ill wind will blow them good.

“This is not a good thing for Korean companies. In the first quarter of this year, Micron’s share of NAND memory semiconductors was around 10 percent, while China’s YMTC accounted for almost 6 percent. The share of 128-layer NAND semiconductors accounts for about 40 percent of the total share of NAND, and YMTC may have acted because it believes its technology can displace Korean and U.S. technology,” a Korean researcher told the Korea Times.

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China zooms by Japan as world’s top auto exporter

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TOKYO – The Group of Seven (G7) spent the weekend calling for a pivot away from China’s sprawling supply chains and Beijing’s rising economic power.

Yet new data on pivots in the automotive world, released as G7 leaders were signing their communique, reminded investors why it’s too late for that.

China zoomed past Japan in the first three months of 2023 to become the world’s top auto exporter. Driving the milestone: a 58% year-on-year surge in China’s automobile exports in the January-March period to 1.07 million units.

Adding insult to injury, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers noted that the increase is partly due to deliveries to Russia. It’s a stark reminder that global sanctions on Moscow over the Ukraine war are proving to be more Swiss cheese than the united front US President Joe Biden envisioned.

Tokyo got its own stark warning, too. The other big reason China is exporting more vehicles than Japan Inc is booming demand for electric vehicles (EVs). This is a market, of course, at which Toyota Motor and other Japanese giants looked askance – to their growing detriment.

China didn’t, which explains why Elon Musk built his first outside-the-US Tesla “Gigafactory” in Shanghai, not Yokohama. Tesla’s China operation is, for now, the top exporter of new energy autos. As of September 2022, Tesla had reached 90,000 domestic orders, according to local media reports.

“These are big market shifts happening at a quick pace,” says Jorge Guajardo, a partner at Dentons Global Advisors.

An aerial photo shows hundreds of Tesla Model Y and Model 3 inside its Gigafactory in Shanghai on January 2, 2020. Photo: Supplied

Economist Jack Gao at the Institute for New Economic Thinking adds: “You know this would happen one day. You know it’s EVs they were hoping to leapfrog the competition with, you know the domestic market size would play a key role here. Still, this happened fast.”

Shanghai scoring the Tesla factory was a major coup for then-local Communist Party boss, now national premier Li Qiang. China surpassing Japan in auto exports is arguably the most significant changing of the guard since 2011, when China pulled ahead of its regional rival in gross domestic product (GDP) terms.

It also highlights the kind of transformation Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s No 2 is pledging to unleash in Asia’s biggest economy. In March, Li reassured global investors that the regulatory crackdown since late 2020 had run its course.

In recent years, Li said, “there were some incorrect discussions and comments in the society, which made some private entrepreneurs feel worried. From a new starting point, we will create a market-oriented, legalized and internationalized business environment, treat enterprises of all types of ownership equally, protect the property rights of enterprises and the rights and interests of entrepreneurs.”

The new government, Li said, will “promote fair competition among various business entities, and support the development and growth of private enterprises.”

What’s more, China’s automobile success is apparently picking up increased momentum. Domestic auto groups generally expect Chinese exports to increase 30% year on year in 2023.

This milestone can’t make Japan or the broader G7 very happy. It’s been 14 years, in 2009, since China became the largest market for new vehicles.

Since then, Beijing has generally speaking been more proactive than the US or Japan in jumpstarting the EV market through tax or other incentives. China also saw building charging stations around the nation as a means of creating jobs and growth in regional economies. That’s now paying off.

In the first quarter alone, sales of EVs and other new energy vehicles jumped 93% year on year to 380,000 units. Such autos account for about 40% of China’s total exports. At present, the leading destinations for Chinese-manufactured new energy autos are Belgium, Australia and Thailand.

For Japan, the Thailand piece of the puzzle is particularly ominous. Though often called the “Detroit of Asia,” Thailand has long been dominated by Japan Inc icons. If Thai chieftains decide EVs are the more lucrative bet, Japan might have to relocate factories.

All this should be a wake-up call for Detroit, too, as Republicans attempt to reverse Biden’s policies to promote EVs and greener growth in general. As the global market pivots toward EVs, General Motors’ gas-guzzling trucks might meet no more demand overseas than Toyota’s hybrid vehicles.

Thailand has doubled down on electric vehicle production to stay competitive. Photo: Facebook

One question raised by all this: how could America, which invented the mass production of autos, have been this asleep at the wheel? Likewise, how could Japan, which created a better production mouse trap, have lost the plot this egregiously?

It’s worth noting that the China threat that the G7 is so sure it can contain is only just beginning in the auto space, many analysts say. China is still working to roll out its own mass-produced EV line priced US$10,000 lower than major Western brands.

This test for China Inc remains, of course. To be sure, mainland success stories Chery Automobile and Great Wall Motor are expanding sales in Russia at a rapid clip. It’s unclear, though, if such companies that are funded by entities linked to Chinese municipal governments have the capacity to thrive globally.

Yet the G7 is making it easier for China Inc to spread its wings. After Vladimir Putin’s soldiers invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Toyota, Volkswagen AG and others shuttered Russian production facilities. Mainland automakers promptly stepped into the void.

To strategist Yan Wang at Alpine Macro, new auto data solves a recent mystery. “Why,” he wondered, is China’s “trade surplus going through the roof? This is one of the reasons: Vehicle exports are exploding, while imports tumbled.”

It’s a big deal. To strategist James Thorne at Wellington-Altus Private Wealth, it’s a sign that “the globalization theme is not dead.” And that “China is evolving as it should – to high value-added manufacturing and consumption,” Thorne adds.

Risks abound, of course, as the G7 targets supply chains vital to China making high-quality autos – a likely sign of more tit-for-tat moves between the G7 and China.

In Hiroshima last weekend, G7 leaders stressed their plan is to “de-risk,” not decouple from China, while acknowledging challenges posed by the mainland’s practices which they said “distort the global economy.”

In its joint statement, the G7 stressed: “We are not decoupling or turning inwards. At the same time, we recognize that economic resilience requires de-risking and diversifying.”

G7 leaders added, “We will seek to address the challenges posed by China’s non-market policies and practices, which distort the global economy. We will counter malign practices, such as illegitimate technology transfer or data disclosure.”

Yet the odds of additional curbs from Washington or Brussels remain high. Goldman Sachs economist Hui Shan is doubtful that the US Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS, is done clamping down on China. There may be “more focus on refining the existing tariff, export control and investment regimes once basic frameworks are in place,” Hui says.

“We expect them to be fairly narrowly focused on advanced semiconductors and related technologies, paralleling last autumn’s export controls, and do not anticipate significant restrictions on secondary market portfolio investments,” Hui adds.

Fully automated robots running at high speed at Geely Automobile’s Changxing base in the Changxing Economic and Technological Development Zone in Huzhou City, East China’s Zhejiang Province, August 4, 2021. Photo: AFP / Tan Yunfeng / Imaginechina

On Sunday, the Cyberspace Administration of China said products made by US memory chipmaker Micron Technology had failed security reviews and barred key infrastructure operators from buying from the company.

“US-China tensions and technological decoupling may continue to trigger bouts of volatility in 2023,” says strategist Norman Villamin at Union Bancaire Privée. “Supply chain relocations out of China could also drag on activity via weaker foreign direct investment.”

Despite all the noise, China’s auto industry is shifting into a higher gear faster than many expected. The G7 can try to slow things down, but Beijing is reminding Japan and its Western allies that China Inc isn’t sitting still – and indeed is racing ahead.

Follow William Pesek on Twitter at @WilliamPesek

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The long patient queues that triggered Dr Kev Lim’s startup journey to profitability with Qmed Asia

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Family health challenge opened eyes to painful part of patient experience
Building a successful startup requires deep understanding of pain points

As a teenager growing up in Tangkak, Johor, Kev Lim took an interest in computing thanks to his older brother who was pursuing a degree in computer science. Helping himself to…Continue Reading

No clarity yet on China’s confused tech crackdown

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As China lifts Covid-19 restrictions and returns to normalcy, prospects for private business in the post-Covid economic recovery remain uncertain.

Despite former Vice Premier Liu He’s reiteration of the central government’s adherence to market principles at the World Economic Forum in January 2023, there are mixed messages about the Party’s stance towards the private tech sector.

The detention of Bao Fan, chairman and CEO of investment bank China Renaissance Holdings, in February sent shockwaves through international markets and among Chinese tech entrepreneurs. Bao was widely regarded as the country’s top dealmaker, whose company presided over several high-profile domestic tech deals.

On the other hand, Alibaba’s Jack Ma made a surprise reappearance in China in March, after traveling abroad for over a year. In a seemingly friendly gesture to the private sector, the Cyberspace Administration of China announced a campaign to crack down on false publicly circulated information which damages the reputation of private enterprises and entrepreneurs. But all of this does not suffice in restoring confidence in investors and businesses about a rollback of regulatory scrutiny of private tech companies.

To some, Bao’s detention indicates a continuation of Beijing’s heavy-handed approach to the country’s rising entrepreneurs that began with scuttling an initial public offering (IPO) for Ant Group, the e-payments platform founded by Jack Ma, in late 2020. This continued with tightened regulation over data security and anti-monopoly practices involving tech companies.

The Party’s stance and policy towards the tech sector — or more precisely, technology platforms and their partners — should be read in light of the multiple, often competing, challenges that the Party faces in governing modern China.

Chinese big tech and innovative entrepreneurs have contributed significantly to China’s transformation into a digital economy. At the same time, their rapid growth in size and wealth, as well as their evolving business models, have generated new challenges and instabilities.

Fintech regulation is one of these contradictions. Despite the merits of financial technology, excessive microlending without adequate security could create a financial bubble, posing systemic risk to the national financial system. Fintech companies like Ant have been forced to restructure and made subject to similar regulatory rules that govern other lending institutions.

The logo of Ant Group in Hangzhou Photo: AFP

Another area of contest is in the competition for talent across various fields related to technology development. The 14th Five-year Plan (2021–2025) spelled out ambitious objectives to turn China into a manufacturing powerhouse and a leader in emerging industries.

Competitive remuneration packages and unparalleled career prospects offered by leading platform companies, as well as the perceived invulnerability of the industry, had drawn many bright, young minds into technology-related business fields. This has changed since the government’s policy shift in 2020.

China now needs people to contribute to scientific and technological self-sufficiency in areas such as semiconductor development, robotics and climate change. The state’s clampdown on the business tech sector is thought to have had the effect of pushing people and resources into other areas — such as materials science, industrial machinery and biotechnology — deemed important to China’s overall technological capacity.

The Party’s tough treatment of some tech entrepreneurs could also have been connected to power struggles within the Party itself. Some key investors behind Ant Group’s IPO were known to be linked to top officials and elites with strong ties to former leader Jiang Zemin.

The tech sector may have become the site of a contest for political power. It is unclear with whom Bao is associated inside political circles, but he may have been caught up in a broader political struggle.

Party leaders will certainly continue to rely on China’s tech giants and their innovation to drive the economy. But ensuring that data is managed and used to the benefit of the Party as well as the public, not just private actors, remains a key logic in the Chinese Communist Party’s governance.

The announcement at the “Two Sessions” of the establishment of a National Data Bureau is Beijing’s latest step to exploit the country’s massive data trove. This will allow institutionalization of the management and control of data, while also facilitating circulation of both public and private data resources to promote economic and social development.

Setting up the new National Data Bureau under the National Development and Reform Commission will give focus to implementing policies that help drive digital and cutting-edge industries. The bureau could potentially become a driver of “Digital China“, after years of slow development because of the pandemic and regulatory scrutiny.

Given the Party’s overriding priorities of rebuilding a strong domestic economy and maintaining robust supply chains against external threats, it is unlikely to embark on an extensive campaign like it did in 2020 and 2021 to rein in technology platforms. That would undermine an important engine of growth and investor confidence, adding pressures to government finances.

One can still expect uncertainties over how the Party treats individual private businesses. This is especially so when China’s political leaders deem it necessary to prioritize certain objectives, such as political control and maintaining social stability over other priorities including economic recovery and growth.

Yvette To is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Public and International Affairs at the City University of Hong Kong.

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

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Roadshow in South Korea sparks investor interest

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The Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand (IEAT) says an investment roadshow in South Korea on May 15–18, in collaboration with the Board of Investment of Thailand (BOI), was a success.

Veeris Ammarapala, the IEAT governor, said on Sunday the roadshow under the concept “Thailand Investment Promotion Strategy: New Economy, New Opportunities,” included a discussion on industrial investment in Thailand with 40 South Korean investors and a one-on-one meeting with those interested in investing in Thailand.

Of them, five investors appeared to have an interest in investing in some industries, including businesses related to electric vehicles and renewable energy.

Four of the investors, according to Mr Veeris, are from industries spanning electric tricycles and electric motorcycles; anti-fog technology for cars; medical technology and equipment; and vehicle parts.

Those companies planned to invest by renting land in industrial estates, especially in the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC) development area. The total investment is expected to be about two billion baht.

Mr Veeris also added that another investor wanted to invest at least 5 billion baht on an industrial estate project and renewable energy utility development with IEAT.

The roadshow also included a roundtable meeting with Park Jae Hong, chairman of the Korea Electric Vehicle Industry Association (KEVIA), and other 25 Korean investors, he said.

The discussion focused on the benefits that KEVIA members would receive if they decided to invest here, with the investment helping develop Thailand’s electric vehicle (EV) supply chain, he said.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Labour’s Department of Employment has been told by Samsung Heavy Industries, a major shipbuilding company in South Korea, that it wants another 1,227 Thai skilled labourers for its workforce, Labour Minister Suchart Chomklin said on Sunday.

The 1,227 positions include 527 welders, 500 painters and 200 electricians, with salaries of 90,000-108,000 baht. Mr Suchart said the ministry has been in close contact with the Korea Offshore and Shipbuilding Association (Khoshipa) to send Thai workers to South Korea with an E-7 visa for skilled labour.

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China fails Micron in security review

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US-based Micron, the world’s third-largest maker of memory chips, failed a security review by the Cyberspace Administration of China, the government body announced May 21. “The review found that Micron’s products have serious network security risks, which pose significant security risks to China’s critical information infrastructure supply chain, affecting China’s national security,” an official statement said. No details were given.

Posters on Chinese news and social media sites viewed the measure as retaliation for American tech controls against China. “Those who want to eat Chinese food but want to smash the Chinese pot at the same time, should think clearly. This means that Micron will lose an important market,” wrote one commentator. “Companies that actively participate in the containment of the technology industry in mainland China, should think about it carefully.”

China announced the security review of Micron on March 31.

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