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Shanghai to benefit from new bank's HQ

The newly established BRICS development bank, to be headquartered in Shanghai, will help the city realize the aspiration of becoming a global financial center, experts said.

"It's the first time a major international institution will be headquartered in Shanghai. It signals that the city's financial services are of a global standard," said Chen Bo, an economist at Shanghai University of Finance and Economics.

Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, or BRICS, announced the founding of the New Development Bank on July 15 during a summit in Brazil.

The new bank reflects the growing influence of BRICS, which accounts for almost half the world's population and about one-fifth of global economic output.

It will have an initial subscribed capital of $50 billion equally shared among the founding members, and will support infrastructure and sustainable projects in developing countries.

Xi pledges further ties with South Africa

Chinese President Xi Jinping has pledged to raise China-South Africa ties to a new level.

He met South African President Jacob Zuma during the BRICS summit in Fortaleza and Brasilia, Brazil.

Xi said that during his South Africa tour last year the two countries had agreed to make their relations a priority of each other's overall foreign policies, and pledged to maintain the momentum of that trip.

He highlighted cooperation, particularly in energy, mineral resources, agriculture, infrastructure, rail locomotives and nuclear energy, and also invited Zuma to visit China in the second half of this year.

Athletics body issues alert ahead of games

The Confederation of African Athletics is concerned with the tendency by some rival federations to enter over-aged competitors in its meetings.

Colonel Hamad Kalkaba Malboum, president of the confederation, said the practice negates the logic of organizing age-based events for younger athletes.

"It was discouraging, during the Africa Youth Games in Gaborone, Botswana, that some athletes were older than their registered age. CAA is ready to fight against age cheating."

The issue resurfaced at the recent Africa Youth Games in Botswana, which involved athletes from 52 African countries in 21 sports. The event is widely used as a qualifier for the Youth Olympic Games. The Youth Olympics will be held in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, in August.

"Personally, I could see that some athletes were not the age they claimed," he said, adding "a child cannot change his age by himself. This is the role of each one of us, not just of an association."

The president said plans to establish a reliable database to check the ages of the athletes were at an advanced stage, and penalties for offenders should be introduced.

South Africa expects greater trade

South Africa has said that boosting trade between BRICS countries remains one of its a key objectives.

Mac Maharaj, a spokesman for President Jacob Zuma, said the country's trade with the other BRICS countries stood at 380.4 billion rand ($36 billion), 27.5 percent higher than 2012's figure of 298.2 billion rand ($28 billion).

"BRICS membership advances South Africa's national interests through pursuing key economic priorities related to poverty alleviation, job creation and reducing inequality," he said.

Foton launches vans for African market

Chinese automaker Beiqi Foton has launched its latest models of van in Kenya.

Wang Jinyu, the general manager, said in the capital, Nairobi, that the country is an emerging market for commercial vehicles on the continent.

"We hope to provide transport solutions for growing urban centers in Kenya and the entire African region," he said, adding that Chinese firms are impressed by the favorable investment climate in Kenya.

Foton East Africa General Manager Calvin Guo said his firm integrates leading global technology to manufacture vehicles that meet world standards.

"We hope to use our rich experience in urban transport to help develop commuter transport in Africa," he said.

Foton has invested more than $30 million in an assembly plant in Kenya, with four branches there and one in Uganda.

"We are also planning to establish a presence in Tanzania," he said. There are now about 2,000 Foton vehicles on Kenyan roads.

Xi, Obama vow to keep ties on path

President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart Barack Obama agreed to move forward a "new type of major country relationship" during a phone conversation on the night of July 14.

The two presidents spoke while Xi was in Fortaleza, during the Brazilian leg of his four-country visit to Latin America.

The two leaders have maintained close contact with each other since they met at the Annenberg Retreat in California in June last year, and they have since exchanged views about the recently concluded sixth Strategic and Economic Dialogue and fifth US-China People-to-People Exchange in Beijing.

Xi said the dialogue has injected vitality into the China-US relationship, and that he appreciated Obama's greetings to the dialogue, in which the US president said the United States welcomed China's peaceful rise.

Chinese-funded vehicle assembly plant opens

South African President Jacob Zuma has officially unveiled a new Chinese vehicle assembly plant investment in the country.

The plant, in the COEGA Industrial Development Zone at the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro in Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape province, is being funded jointly by China's First Automotive Works Group Corporation and the China-Africa Development Fund.

Zuma said the 600 million rand ($57 million) investment will create much needed jobs and promote an improvement in the lives of many people in the area.

The plant will initially assemble 5,000 trucks annually for the Sub-Saharan African market.

This project is part of the South African government's overall plan to expand its manufacturing industry, particularly projects developed in joint-venture with foreign investors.

Luxury car sales still accelerating

The ultra luxury vehicle sector in China continued to grow in the first half of the year despite worries of a drop in sales due to the government's frugality campaign.

Stable economic growth and, more importantly, local consumers becoming more mature, helped support first-half sales and provide confidence for future growth, industry players said.

German sports car maker Porsche reported 19,800 vehicles delivered in China in the first half, an annual rise of 8 percent.

Britain's Rolls-Royce Motor Cars enjoyed a record half-year in 2014, with sales in the Asia-Pacific region increasing nearly 40 percent. Though there was no country-by-country breakdown, the region's boom was led by the company's largest single country market, China.

Universities stress admission fairness

Top Chinese universities are taking new steps to improve transparency and fairness in admissions.

Renmin University of China has launched a series of new initiatives to welcome supervision from outside the university, such as opening a publicity platform on the university's recruitment website and renewing and tightening undergraduate student recruitment policies.

The school has stressed increased transparency in this year's independent recruitment, during which students enroll on the basis of a comprehensive assessment that includes sports achievements and artistic talent as well as performance in standard college entrance exams, said university spokesman Wang Hongwei. It is doing this by publicizing these students' exam scores and the preferential policies to which they are entitled, Wang said.

Li Xiangqian, director of the university's admissions office, said 10 to 15 percent of first-year students will be re-examined randomly in the new semester in an effort to guarantee recruitment transparency and fairness.

More Chinese set to travel to Brazil

Charmed by the recently ended World Cup and the Olympic Games in 2016, more Chinese tourists are interested in visiting Brazil.

According to the Brazilian embassy in Beijing, more than 5,000 Chinese tourists traveled to Brazil during the World Cup.

"The real total is probably even bigger," said Guiherme Belli, the World Cup affairs specialist from the embassy. "The World Cup was a perfect chance for Chinese tourists to get to know Brazil. The tournament will attract more tourists to Brazil in the future."

The pull and popularity of the tournament would boost the number of Chinese tourists to Brazil to 100,000 a year soon, he said. In 2012, 65,000 Chinese visited the country.

Latin American mining projects to pay off

Output from China's mining projects in Latin America will boom over the next several years, but the country's investment in the region's resources industry will slow, analysts said.

Chang Xingguo, project director of international minerals and the finance department of the China Mining Association, said China has invested in many copper and iron ore projects in Latin America since 2005, when commodity prices were high.

Most of the investments in the region are copper mines in countries such as Peru, a major copper producer, and Brazil.

China has about 23 overseas copper projects with a total reserve of about 59 million metric tons, according to data from the China Mining Association.

UN body: China boosts IP protection

The head of the World Intellectual Property Organization spoke highly of China's achievements in intellectual property protection on July 11, a day after the United Nations agency opened an office in Beijing.

In a meeting with Premier Li Keqiang, Francis Gurry, the organization's director-general, said China's "remarkable" progress in IP protection has helped transform and advance the country's economy and has been a boon to global economic growth.

"The organization welcomes China to play a bigger constructive role in setting up relevant international regulations," Gurry said in a news release in Chinese from China's central government.

Li told Gurry the Chinese government is trying to help scientists and high-tech talent by boosting their rights to benefit from their research.

TV presenter detained in corruption inquiry

The number of senior officials facing corruption probes in the first half of this year has surpassed last year's total, and the crackdown has been marked by recent investigations of TV station employees and two vice-ministerial-level officials.

Prosecutors reportedly detained Rui Chenggang (pictured), a star presenter on China Central Television's finance and economics channel, and the channel's deputy director-general, Li Yong, Caixin Magazine said.

On June 1, the Supreme People's Procuratorate announced authorities were investigating the channel's director-general, Guo Zhenxi, and producer Tian Liwu on corruption allegations.

Caixin Magazine said prosecutors detained Rui at his office on July 11. Some observers have said the investigation of Rui is related to Guo's fall.

APEC event security 'on par with Olympics'

Beijing police have completed security planning for the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting, which they see as the most important event in the capital since the 2008 Olympics, an official said on July 11.

APEC is a forum for 21 Pacific Rim member economies to promote free trade.

For police officers across the city, guaranteeing security at the meeting in Beijing's Huairou district in November is the top priority, said Fu Zhenghua, chief of the Beijing Public Security Bureau. "The meeting is the biggest event in the capital in the second half of the year, and its security arrangements and scale put it on a par with the 2008 Olympics," said Fu, who is also the vice-minister of public security.

In four months, representatives of many countries, including foreign leaders, journalists and businesspeople, will gather in Beijing, he said.

To ensure that the event proceeds smoothly, he said, subcommand posts in the city will all have their own detailed, specific tasks and responsibilities in the security plan.

China Daily-Xinhua

(China Daily Africa Weekly 07/18/2014 page2)