XI'S TRIP TO ZHEJIANG BOOSTS CONFIDENCE

President Xi Jinping has offered a confidence boost to the market and businesses with his four-day inspection trip to Zhejiang province, in which he underlined the importance of turning crisis into opportunities and fostering new growth engines amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Xi, who is also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, started his trip with a visit to the Port of Ningbo-Zhoushan, the world's busiest in terms of cargo tonnage and the world's third-largest container port.

He called for proactive efforts to respond to and mitigate the impact of restrictive measures adopted by different countries on cargo transportation, in order to ensure China's exported goods can be delivered and imported goods can enter the country.

The port visit came days after Xi chaired a meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee that highlighted the need to enhance international trade and economic cooperation, bolster the development of international logistics and supply chain systems, and ensure smooth international cargo transportation.

His next destination was an industrial park that produces auto parts and molds in Ningbo, where he met with workers, business leaders and officials and listened to their opinions.

He reiterated the important role of private businesses and small and medium-sized enterprises in China's industrial development.

The pandemic has to varying degrees hurt a range of businesses, and the CPC Central Committee has rolled out a mix of policies to counter the impact. These will be refined in line with the course of the pandemic, Xi said.

He encouraged SMEs to give play to the spirit of entrepreneurship, remain enterprising and conquer the challenges posed by the outbreak.

With an export and import volume of 3.08 trillion yuan ($434 billion) last year, Zhejiang is one of China's leading powerhouses in foreign trade, accounting for 9.8 percent of the national total.

The province's private sector, which accounted for 95.9 percent of all market players, contributed to about 65.5 percent of its GDP and 71.6 percent of foreign trade volume, and created 90 percent of its new jobs last year, according to Economic Daily.

Xu Xiujun, a researcher on international political economy at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said the booming foreign trade of Zhejiang and its flourishing private sector are the reasons Xi chose the province as his destination.

"The foreign trade sector and private businesses both have crucial roles in creating jobs, which is currently a top priority for policymakers," he said.

The province is also a pillar of the regional economy, since a rebound of economic growth in the province can lead regional and even national recovery, he said.

"The resumption of the supply and industry chains in Zhejiang is also of paramount importance to the global supply and industry chains," he said.

In a meeting with provincial officials of Zhejiang on Wednesday, Xi said crises and opportunities always coexist, and the conquering of a crisis means opportunities will come.

With the accelerated spread of the pandemic overseas and international trade and economic activities being severely jeopardized, China's economic growth faces fresh challenges, he said.

However, the pandemic also brought about fresh opportunities for China to speed up its growth in science and technology and promote the upgrading of industries, Xi said, adding that it is important to capture and create opportunities from the crisis and difficulties at the moment.

CHINA PRESSING THE RESET BUTTON FOR TOKYO GAMES

China's sports officials and athletes are embracing the Olympics' one-year delay with a positive mindset, despite the many challenges the postponement presents.

With the Tokyo Games now rescheduled for July 23-Aug 8 next year due to the coronavirus pandemic, China's sports governing bodies have voiced cautious support for the decision as they begin to evaluate the postponement's impact on the country's sporting landscape.

In a statement released on Tuesday, the Chinese Olympic Committee said it will make sure that all parties involved in the delay prepare properly for the postponed Games.

"The COC supports the decision of the International Olympic Committee and believes that the IOC and the Tokyo Olympic organizing committee will well handle the relevant issues and successfully host the Tokyo 2020 Olympics," read the statement.

"The COC will continue to maintain close communications with the IOC, the Tokyo 2020 organizers and each sport's world governing body, to continue analyzing, assessing and properly responding to the follow-up tasks, and to actively adjust China's preparations to the revised Tokyo 2020."

The delay of the Summer Games, which were originally scheduled to open on July 24 this year, also presents challenges for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, perhaps most significantly the shrinking of its original two-year marketing window.

The shortened period between both events has sparked concerns that media coverage, sponsorship revenue and public interest for the winter sports extravaganza could be diminished.

However, Beijing 2022 has reiterated that the adjustment won't slow down its efforts to prepare for a successful Winter Games.

"The new dates for the Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games mean we are faced with a special situation where the Summer Games and Winter Games are to be held within half a year of each other," an anonymous official of the Beijing 2022 organizing committee told Xinhua on Tuesday.

"We will have a detailed assessment of how the new dates of Tokyo 2020 will affect the Beijing 2022 Games. We believe the Summer Games in Tokyo and the Winter Games in Beijing will both be a success," the official added.

However, with the Summer Olympics traditionally outshining the Winter Games in scale, marketing potential and audience appeal, delivering Beijing 2022 less than a year after the Olympic flame goes out in Tokyo will be far from straightforward.

"It now becomes a challenge for Beijing 2022 and the rest of the big events scheduled after the delayed Tokyo Games, such as the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou, to maintain the exposure and potential investment from sponsors to the level they would've enjoyed had it not been for the postponement," Li Hai, a sports economy professor at Shanghai University of Sport, told shobserver.com.

IOC president Thomas Bach has admitted that the convergence of three Olympic events, including the 2022 Youth Games in Dakar, Senegal, poses major challenges for the Olympic Movement.

CHINA BRINGS 1,457 BACK FROM ABROAD ON 9 ARRANGED CHARTER FLIGHTS

China arranged nine charter flights in March that brought back 1,457 Chinese citizens abroad, including overseas students from Iran, Italy and other countries, Vice-Foreign Minister Ma Zhaoxu said on Thursday.

Speaking at a news conference in Beijing, Ma also said that the ministry allocated and distributed 500,000 "health kits" to countries concentrated with overseas Chinese students, including more than 11 million masks, 500,000 epidemic prevention materials and guidelines.

AUTO PRODUCTION FULLY RESUMES IN CHINA

China has actively guided domestic auto companies to strengthen production from overseas suppliers, the Ministry of Commerce said on Thursday.

Domestic auto and parts production has fully resumed, and the pressure on the automotive supply chain has been alleviated.

OUTBREAK SETS STAGE FOR BETTER HEALTH TIES

Sooner or later, the pandemic will be brought under control across the globe. The question is how much pain people, countries, economies and the world will have to go through.

Eliminating borders to the sharing of knowledge could help to minimize the pain.

COVID-19 has already spurred the movement toward even greater sharing of information across borders. This helps counter one of the scariest things about the outbreak: uncertainty.

China's experience and willingness to share knowledge could now come in handy for the rest of the world. The pandemic is picking up speed in Europe and North America just as it slows down in China, where most new cases are imported.

China has something of a lead in understanding what has to be done to contain this virus as well as a head start in developing treatments, isolating the virus and building up a knowledge bank that could prove instrumental in bringing the pandemic under control.

The pandemic could help China tap into international research partnerships, while also helping the rest of the world to tap into Chinese expertise.

A case in point is the development of a vaccine and treatments for the coronavirus.

Developing more effective treatments should become easier, since the sharing of knowledge among countries, regulators and researchers would speed up these processes.

For instance, Chengdu-based Clover Biopharmaceuticals had produced an early vaccine candidate for COVID-19 by mid-February. The company quickly set out to look for partners to speed up the development of its vaccine and is working with GlaxoSmithKline, a London-based pharmaceutical company.

Another company, Beijing Advaccine Biotechnology, is working with Inovio Pharmaceuticals of the United States on a vaccine that is moving into early stage trials, perhaps as early as next month.

Since early February, multinational pharmaceutical company Gilead has been working with Chinese authorities to speed up the testing process for remdesivir to treat COVID-19. Remdesivir was originally developed to treat Ebola and is not yet approved anywhere in the world.

These collaborative efforts could pave the way for the kind of knowledge sharing that makes the world a better place.

BLOOD DONATION CENTERS REOPEN IN WUHAN

All 12 blood donation spots around the Wuhan, the city hit hardest by the novel coronavirus, reopened on Monday after more than two months' suspension due to the lockdown of the city. Some 250 citizens have donated more than 70,000 milliliters of blood in just three days, but the blood reserves are still in short supply.

"We only raised half the volume compared with the same period last year," said Zhou Zhihua, Party chief of the Wuhan Blood Center. "As more and more hospitals start receiving normal patients, the blood demand will accelerate quickly.

"One of the most important things people can do right now during this public health emergency is to donate blood. If you are healthy and feeling well, please make an appointment to donate as soon as possible."

Experts warned that the clinical use of blood may reach its peak in the next two months due to the surge of non-novel coronavirus operations and a shortage of donors. Healthy people are needed now to donate to help patients counting on lifesaving blood.

According to Zhou, the current blood reserve is only sufficient for 10 days of clinical use.

"If the blood demand increases rapidly, the blood reserve may even decrease to one week of availability," Zhou said.

In order to attract more blood donations, Zhou, along with more than 60 staff at the center and their families, held a blood drive on Wednesday.

"We fought against the novel coronavirus together, and now we must take care of one another including those who are most vulnerable among us in hospitals," Zhou said.

Zhu Min, a 26-year-old resident who donated during the event, said: "I can't help too many people, but I can try my best to do what I can do."

The center has taken measures to protect the health of donors and staff, including checking body temperatures, providing hand sanitizer, following social distancing practices and enhancing disinfection of surfaces and equipment.

Blood collection staff are also required to adhere to thorough safety protocols, including wearing gloves, to help prevent the spread of any type of infection.

Zhou said that all collected blood would undergo nucleic acid testing for the novel coronavirus as well as antibody tests before being used, even though there is no evidence that the novel coronavirus can be transmitted by blood transfusion.

ONLINE JOB FAIRS FILL THE GAP IN RECRUITING

Under the dual pressures of the coronavirus outbreak and poverty alleviation targets, China has been taking measures to promote employment for the poor through online job fairs. "I didn't expect to get a job through my cellphone. I'm satisfied with the post and salary they offered me," said Zhu Fei, a migrant worker from an impoverished mountain village in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.

Zhu was hired by a food company in Zhoushan, Zhejiang province, through an online job fair organized by the local government. He said the local government provided him with free transport to Zhoushan and a monthly subsidy of 200 yuan ($28) for epidemic prevention for three months.

The number of migrant workers in China reached 290 million last year, with 75 million working outside their home provinces, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics. Many of them are from poverty-stricken families.

The novel coronavirus outbreak forced millions of migrant workers like Zhu to stay at home after this year's Spring Festival holiday in late January, depriving them of salaries to support their families.

With government support, many companies have conducted job interviews online after the cancellation of job fairs to avoid mass gatherings.

Deng Shubing, recruitment director of the Chinese sportswear group Li Ning, said the company plans to recruit 1,300 production-line workers this year. The goal is now 90 percent achieved. "Over 80 percent of applicants were recruited online, either through online job fairs held by the human resources departments in Nanning or through the video-sharing app TikTok," Deng said.

She added the recruitment, in collaboration with local government, enables the company to easily find the workers they need.

As of March 19, the human resources and social security departments in Guangxi had held 850 online job fairs and posted more than 1.5 million jobs for 28,573 enterprises through websites, mobile apps and the social media platform WeChat.

Online information about jobs in the public service sector for those struggling to gain employment is also offered.

RURAL WORKERS GETTING BACK TO THEIR JOBS

More than 20 million rural workers in 25 provincial regions have returned to their jobs as the novel coronavirus outbreak has abated in China, according to the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development.

Some 2.11 million of them are from the 52 counties labeled as impoverished, according to Wang Chunyan, deputy director of the office's general department.

"They account for 83 percent of last year's migrant workers in the 52 counties," she told a daily news conference in Beijing.

Wu Hua, deputy head of the office's department of development guidance, said the progress has instilled momentum into the national poverty relief work that aims to end absolute poverty before 2021.

Migrant workers can be found in a large percentage of rural families still mired in poverty or those who have recently shaken it off. Two-thirds of their income comes from earnings from working outside, Wu said.

The developments came as the central authorities have prioritized the employment of rural workers as well as efforts to make sure they do not get laid off amid the epidemic.

As of March 27, local authorities have arranged chartered buses and trains for 1.38 million migrant workers returning to work, according to Wu.

But he noted that an estimated 5 million have yet to return to their posts at factories or construction sites.

"We will actively give them guidance and create conditions for them to resume work as soon as possible," he said.

Apart from travel restrictions that prevented migrant workers from reaching their jobs, the novel coronavirus also disrupted logistics chains at the height of the outbreak, leading to the lackluster sales of farm produce and threatening to push many back into poverty.

To reduce the impact, Wang said her department, along with several other government agencies, have launched a campaign to promote the consumption of farm produce from impoverished regions.

A circular was issued on Feb 14 to help identify "poverty relief products", so that businesses and government agencies in better-off regions can help promote the sales of such products.

Wu said 22 provinces in central and western provinces have identified 22,566 such products worth more than 215.2 billion yuan ($30.3 billion) as of March 27, involving 10,269 suppliers scattered across some 1,000 counties.

Nine eastern provinces have purchased farm produce worth more than 2.1 billion yuan, he said, adding the farmer's dilemma has generally been relieved.

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

Who is sure of their own motives can in confidence advance or retreat - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe