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When asked to explain the difference in the recently released Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) of China’s manufacturing sector, the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing (CFLP) insisted it had a broader coverage and reliable survey process.

According to CFLP’s figure, China’s PMI rose for the fourth straight month in March to 52.4 percent, up 3.4 percentage points from a month earlier.

It is the first time in seven months that the figure stood above 50. As a barometer of domestic economic performance, a reading of above 50 in PMI suggests expansion, while one below 50 indicates contraction.

But brokerage CLSA’s PMI survey suggested a reverse trend. It dipped to 44.8 percent in March from 45.1 in February.

Chen Zhongtao, a senior economist of CFLP told Xinhua that both organization used the same analyzing methods, but the difference came mainly from sampling disparities.

CFLP surveyed 730 companies, which provided a broader coverage compared with CLSA’s some 400, he said.

The sampling of the official figure had ensured the survey covered large, medium-sized and smaller enterprises, said Chen.

CLSA’s head of economic research department was not available for comment when Xinhua called. In a research note provided to Xinhua by the firm, it admitted the gap in size, but insisted the differences was caused more by the adjustment to data for seasonality.

“It is true that the CFLP survey sample size is larger than that of the CLSA China PMI…therefore the standard error of the (population) estimates from the CFLP survey should be around 25 percent smaller than those from the China PMI,” said the note released on April 1.

“However in practice all of this is academic. Differences in the samples are dwarfed by differences in how each set of statisticians adjust for seasonality in the data,” said the note.

CLSA said it had tuned the March figure as the February and March varied in number of days in a month and the latter month affected by the long Chinese lunar New Year holiday.

Though both sides made seasonality adjustment, the CFLP figure was usually boosted by around three points by seasonality in March, said the CLSA note.

Yu Ying, general manager of CLII, which carried out the PMI survey for CFLP, admitted the CLSA figure had smaller short-term fluctuations, if the historical figures from the two sides were compared.

“The March figure is within our estimate, when the February figure had recovered to 49 percent,” said Yu.

The seasonality influence did affect the March figure of CFLP, as manufacturers usually had peak output in March and April, said Yu.

Despite the seasonal factor, Chen believed the consecutive rise for four straight months of CFLP figure was mainly in accordance with the national economic trend.

NBS head Ma Jiantang echoed his opinion. “The continuous rebound of the PMI not only shows the government economic stimulus package has begun to take obvious effect, but also indicates a stabilizing and warming economy,” Ma said.

As a joint conductor of the survey, the National Bureau of Statistics helped CFLP to ensure the survey be carried out through reliable channels.

Zhang Liqun, researcher with development Research Center of the State Council, said the rising trend of the PMI indicated improvement in overall economic performance and would continue in the second quarter with stimulus policies continuing to pay off.

“The fact that the PMI rebounded above 50 percent in March, especially that the indices for output and new orders have stood above 50 percent for two consecutive months since February, implied future acceleration in the country’s economic growth,” Zhang said.

More than eight years after their revealing report on the perceptions of Asian Americans, the Committee of 100 (C-100) on Monday released a new report, indicating that despite a positive trend in the attitudes toward Asian Americans, racial discrimination and suspicions still exist.

The report, entitled “Still the ‘Other?’: Public Attitudes Toward Chinese and Asian Americans” indicates that even in 2009, the majority of the general population cannot make a distinction between Chinese Americans and Asian Americans in general, treating all as one generic, monolithic ethnic group, with 28 percent or more saying they rarely or never interact with Asian Americans.

“Race is not black and white — literally nor figuratively. Whatever our own individual backgrounds or political preferences, the facts are clear - the face of the nation is changing as it never has before,” said Frank H. Wu, vice chair for research at C-100 and the author of “Yellow: Race In America Beyond Black and White”.

“As we strive to make good on the American Dream that attracted so many of us and our ancestors, we must see our shared interests in advancing civil rights principles. All of us benefit from the principles of diversity and inclusion. We cannot succeed without bridge building,” Wu said.

“At a time when some pundits claim that America has moved beyond race, this survey shows that there is broad ignorance of significant populations of Americans. In the absence of real information, harmful stereotypes still render Asian Americans as ‘Other’ outsiders to our democracy,” said Helen Zia, vice chair for media at C-100 and the author of “Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of An American People”.

“This survey underscores how our whole society benefits when attitudes and policies are based on factual knowledge and attitudes that allow for the full participation of all Americans,” Zia said.

Despite the approximately 59,141 Asian Americans serving in active duty in the U.S. Armed Services, and the more than 300 Asian Americans who have been injured or died in Operation Iraqi Freedom, there are still suspicions about the loyalty of Asian Americans.

Among the general population, 45 percent believe Asian Americans are more loyal to their countries of ancestry than to the United States, up from 37 percent in the 2001 survey.

C-100’s survey reports that 36 percent of the general population think that Asian Americans have the right amount of power and influence in Washington, while only 15 percent of Chinese Americans believe this to be true. However, 47 percent of the general population believe that Asian Americans have too little power in Washington, with 82 percent of Chinese Americans agreeing.

C-100 is a national non-partisan, non-profit membership organization composed of American citizens of Chinese descent. Each member has achieved positions of leadership in the United States in a broad range of professions and collectively pool their strengths and experience to address important issues concerning the Chinese American community as well as those affecting U.S.-China relations.

A senior Chinese diplomat said here Wednesday that China and the European Union (EU) should push forward mutually beneficial cooperation in all spheres by practicing pragmatism, keeping in mind the overall interest of the bilateral relations and working together to promote common interests between the two peoples.

“If we keep in mind the overall interest of our relations and work together to promote common interest between our peoples, we will be able to enjoy a closer partnership in the long run, and for next month to ensure the upcoming Sino-EU High-Level Dialogue and the summit great success,” said the Chinese Ambassador to the EU Song Zhe in a speech at a seminar on Sino-EU relations in Brussels.

Song said that since the establishment of Sino-EU diplomatic relations in 1975, there had been three outstanding changes in the relationship.

First, he said, the relationship has become more mature and stable in political sense. In recent years, the relations had a triple jump: from constructive partnership to comprehensive partnership and then to comprehensive strategic partnership.

Secondly, the relationship has become more productive and promotive for bilateral cooperation, with China-EU trade volume exceeding 425 billion U.S. dollars in 2008.

Thirdly, the relationship has become more pervasive and influential in international affairs, with the two sides forging a closer partnership dealing with international issues.

On the other hand, Song also singled out three constant factors that moor the relations on steady progress. “They maintain unchanged, and I believe they will not change in the future,” he said.

The first constant is both sides’ commitment to peace, the second one is the pursuit of common development, and the third one is the desire to strengthen friendship, he said.

“These changes and constants illustrate the dynamics, principles and trends of the China-EU relations. The changes bring impetus and progress, whereas the constants ensure stability and sustainability,” said the ambassador.

James Moran, Asia director at the Directorate-General for External Relations of the European Commission, said that a comprehensive strategic partnership does not mean both sides always thinking alike, and they should be able to keep their differences.

He described the current status of Sino-EU ties as “full engagement,” stressing that both sides are interdependent, and have shared values and interests in various areas. China and the EU have had effective cooperation in dealing with global challenges, such as the financial crisis, the fight against weapons proliferation and climate change, and both sides have agreed to fight protectionism, he added.

He highly praised China’s opening-up policy, describing its development as “a globalization success story.”

The EU official said that thanks to great efforts by both sides, the Sino-EU relations have bounced back from the setback at the end of last year culminated by the postponement of the summit.

Both Song and Moran expressed their hopes that the upcoming Sino-EU High-Level Dialogue and the Sino-EU Summit would push forward the steady development of bilateral ties.

China’s central bank on Wednesday announced cuts in both the interest rate and reserve-requirement ratio in the latest effort to boost the domestic economy amid worries over the deepening global financial crisis.

The deposit and lending rates would be lowered by 0.27 percentage points from Thursday and the reserve-requirement ratio would be down by 0.5 percentage points from Oct. 15, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) said.

“This was mainly out of concerns over an economic slowdown,” said Ba Shusong, deputy chief of the Finance Research Institute under the Development Research Center of the State Council.

“The rate cut was expected as the world was faced with a cycle of interest rate cuts,” he told Xinhua.

OUT OF SLOWDOWN CONCERNS

The loosening in monetary policy, the second such move in less than a month, highlighted the government’s rising concern over the slowing economy and slumping capital market.

The PBOC cut the benchmark one-year lending rate by 0.27 percentage points on Sept. 16, the first rate cut in six years. It also lowered the reserve requirement at medium- and small-sized lenders by 1 percentage point as of Sept. 25.

Tang Min, China Development Research Foundation deputy secretary, echoed Ba’s viewpoint.

Tang said the government made the move mainly out of concerns over domestic problems. “The deepening U.S.-originated credit crisis has impacted the psychology of Chinese and also the real economy,” he told Xinhua.

Investors, gripped by lingering fears of global economic downturn, dumped equities to drive the stock market down 66 percent from its peak last October.

China’s gross domestic product (GDP) expanded 10.1 percent in the second quarter of the year, marking a deceleration for four consecutive quarters.

Its exports, a major driver behind the economy, reported slowing growth this year as the credit crisis reduced overseas demand for its goods. This has led to the closures of tens of thousands of local exporters and also job losses.

Local businesses bore the brunt of higher borrowing costs and were even finding it difficult to get credit after last year’s tightening measures aimed at curbing inflation and averting economic overheating.

The easing in inflation has given room for the authorities to loosen monetary policy. The consumer price index rose 4.9 percent in August, off from the 12-year-high of 8.7 percent in February.

“Inflation is no longer a threat with the declining commodities prices,” Tang said.

The monetary policy has been starting to loosen and the trend would not change in the short term, said Zhuang Jian, an Asian Development Bank (ADB) economist. “The whole world doesn’t have strong confidence in the economic outlook.”

TAX CUT TO BOOST DEMAND

In another move to boost domestic demand, the State Council, China’s Cabinet, said it would scrap the 5 percent individual income tax on savings interest earnings starting on Thursday.

China began levying a 20 percent individual income tax on interest earnings in 1999 to narrow the income gap and encourage consumption and investment. The tax rate was slashed to 5 percent on Aug. 15, 2007.

The income tax cut was a must as it would help alleviate the erosion on personal income by high prices, especially given the cut in the deposit rate, Li Yang, head of the Finance Research Institute under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

The tax cut, together with lower borrowing costs, would boost domestic demand, an increasingly more important driver of economy in the global credit crisis, Zuo Xiaolei, China Galaxy Securities chief economist, said.

GLOBAL COORDINATED RESPONSE

The move was also a timely response to the rate cuts by other major central banks and part of a coordinated effort to stem the global crisis, Tang said.

Six other major central banks, including the U.S. Federal Reserve, slashed interest rates on the same day to cope with the current financial crisis.

The U.S. Federal Reserve lowered its target for the federal funds rate by 0.5 percentage points to 1.5 percent. The Bank of England cut its rate by half a point to 4.5 percent and the European Central Bank cut by the same margin to 3.75 percent.

Central banks of Canada, Sweden and Switzerland took similar actions. The Bank of Japan said it strongly supported these policy actions.

Australia’s central bank on Tuesday slashed the interest rate by 1 percentage point, the largest cut since 1992.

As the world strives to survive the financial tsunami, how China uses its large amount of foreign reserves has been a focus of attention.

By September, China had owned 585 billion U.S. dollars in the U.S. government bonds, becoming the largest creditor of the world’s largest economy, according to the latest statistics from the Ministry of Finance. It bought new US national debts every month during this year’s first three quarters.

In September alone, China bought an additional 43.6 billion dollars of U.S. treasury bonds, twice as much as that it held in the previous month.

As the international financial turmoil still evolves, the US government bonds seem to be a low-risk option for the world’s largest developing country to invest its foreign reserves.

Since the outbreak of the US subprime crisis, the world’s turbulent financial market has put China’s more than 1.9-trillion-dollar foreign reserves at a high financial risk.

Some domestic scholars and economists have become increasingly vocal arguing that the country should not hold such a large amount of US government bonds to avoid any possibility that our people may pay for a subprime crisis in the U.S.

There surely are some reasons for such worries. But the question is: can China find a safer investment destination for its foreign reserves in the current international financial market with a lower risk but a higher return? The answer is no.

On the contrary, it turned out that with a large portion of its foreign reserve flowing to low-risk U.S. government bonds, China has successfully minimized the impacts of the ongoing financial crisis upon its own financial structure and the economy as a whole.

It is true that the unstable international financial situations do expose China’s investment in the U.S., either its dollar-holding foreign reserves or American equity products bought by its Chinese financial bodies, to a certain risk of wealth shrinkage.

Some propose the country shift its enormous foreign reserve investment to Europe to evade possible financial risks caused by its excessive concentration in the U.S. market. Then raises another problem: in which areas can the country invest in the European markets and whether the European continent can remain immune to the catastrophic financial sandstorm that first broke out in the world’s most powerful economy?

As a matter of fact, another ideal destination for China to use its foreign reserves is back in Hong Kong’s H-share market. After experiencing the latest round of price decline, a number of stocks in the H-share market have already had no space for a further tumble. Take China Southern Airlines, China Eastern Airlines, and China Aluminum. All the shares of these enterprises are now at a reasonable price level after suffering a steep fall in recent months.

That has not only dealt a severe blow to the confidence of overseas investors in the H-share market, but has also deprived these Hong Kong-listed enterprises of a further financing function.

If the central government uses its strong capital reservoir to buy these enterprises’ stocks, the dented investor confidence in them would be substantively elevated, which would help regain their lost financing functions. As leading enterprises in relevant domestic industries, these companies have long served as the backbone and pillar of our national economy.

Not only listed in Hong Kong, these firms are also listed in Shanghai’s A-share bourse and act as the market’s weighted shares. Shifting part of the country’s foreign reserves to H-shares is also expected to restore investor confidence in the whole domestic stock market if it performs well in more mature Hong Kong capital market. That will influence to some degree the trend of stocks in the A-share market.

The flow of the country’s foreign reserve to H shares will also help investors regain confidence in Hong Kong’s stock market.

Over the past year, stock prices in the region have experienced drastic fluctuations, with its Hang Seng index falling to a little more than 10,000 points from last year’s highest 31,000, or down by more than 60 percent. Considering domestic H-shares play an influential role in Hong Kong’s stock market, the flow of the country’s foreign reserves to H-shares will surely help retrieve investor confidence in Hang Seng’s H-shares.

It is also because we have a better knowledge about the market compared with other risky or uncertain foreign stock markets.

It also means injecting new vitality into the future of the country’s economy. Also, given its large scale, the flow of part of the country’s huge foreign reserve to H-shares will not cause excessive speculations under the current well-developed financial monitoring system in Hong Kong.

China’s manufacturing activities hit a three-year low in November, state media reported Monday, as the global credit crisis begins to take hold in Asia’s second biggest economy.

The purchasing managers’ index (PMI) dropped to 38.8 percent in November, down from 44.6 percent in October and the lowest since the government introduced the survey in 2005, said the Xinhua news agency.

“The data for November showed the overall production activities are contracting sharply,” Ma Qing, a Beijing-based analyst with consultancy CEB Monitor Group, told AFP.

He said the survey gives an idea of the general trend of key November data, scheduled to be released over the next couple of weeks.

Zhang Ping, the minister in charge of the National Development and Reform Commission, the nation’s top economic planning agency, warned last week that China’s economy slowed further last month.

China may be about to experience its worst slowdown in recent memory, with the World Bank warning last week that economic growth in 2009 could hit a 19-year low of 7.5 percent.

The PMI is based on surveys of more than 700 manufacturers for their views on 11 component subindexes including new orders, employment, supply and inventory.

A reading above 50 percent suggests expansion, while anything below 50 percent signals a slowdown.

November’s figure was the fourth time within this year that the PMI dropped below 50 percent, Xinhua said.

The PMI is published by the National Bureau of Statistics in cooperation with the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing.

Investment bank Credit Lyonnais Securities Asia on Monday also released its China PMI report, which covered more than 400 industrial companies.

The report said PMI fell to a new low of 40.9 percent in November, reflecting slowdowns in output, new business and employment.

Women who suffer work stress during early pregnancy may face greater risk of giving birth to underweight babies, a new study shows.

A work week of 32 hours or more and high job strain during the first trimester had an impact on an infant’s birth weight, according to the study conducted by Dutch researchers.

A combination of high job stress and a long work week was associated with the greatest birth-weight reduction and the highest risk of delivering a small-for-gestational-age baby, said the study appearing Thursday in the online issue of the American Journal of Public Health.

The study analyzed responses from 8,266 pregnant women who filled out a questionnaire on employment and working conditions.

“Although pregnant women typically reduce their working hours or workloads at the end of the pregnancy, our results suggest that reducing job strain and working hours in the initial stages of pregnancy may be beneficial among women with stressful full-time jobs,” the researchers concluded.

Earlier studies show that women who suffer stress during pregnancy transmit their anxiety to their unborn child from as early as 17 weeks.

Stress levels in foetuses only four months old — about the time the pregnancy starts to show — rise and fall in line with those of their mothers’, according to earlier studies.

China will not hinge upon depreciation of its currency, renminbi, to expand exports, according to Commerce Minister Chen Deming.

“Given shrinking demand from abroad, the effect of export stimulation through currency depreciation is rather limited,” Wednesday’s People’s Daily quoted Chen as saying.

“Recently, some countries depreciated their currencies but failed to reverse the downward trend of their foreign sales through such moves,” he told the paper.

China hoped that all nations would make joint efforts and enhance coordination to keep international foreign exchange markets stable, Chen said.

Facing impact from serious natural disasters and the worst global financial crisis over the past 100 years, China managed to maintain a steady growth in foreign trade this year. Though the country’s exports to European, U.S. and Japanese markets grew much slower, its sales to emerging markets, such as India and Brazil, went up rapidly, he noted.

He estimated China’s imports and exports would surpass 2.5 trillion U.S. dollars for the whole year, up about 18 percent over last year. The total includes more than 300 billion U.S. dollars in service trade.

As the financial crisis becomes worsening, China is confronted with bigger challenges next year in stabilizing its external trade, Chen told the paper.

He cited further shrinkage in demand from the United State, European Union and Japan, where economies had plunged into recession, trade protectionism and increased trade frictions as the major reasons.

There are also a lot of positive factors, Chen added. For instance, China has raised tax rebates for exporters, made policies to encourage upgrading of processing trade, and taken measures to ensure credit extension for smaller businesses. Meanwhile, China’s exports of daily-use consumer goods were still competitive on international markets, and there were potentials for trade growth with emerging markets and developing nations.

Authorities in Heilongjiang, China’s No.1 commodity grain producer, on Wednesday disclosed an investment plan in which the region’s total annual grain output will be raised to 50 billion kg of grain in five years.

In an addition to a grain output rise, this northeastern Chinese province will also be added with an extra 666,667 hectares of paddy fields by the year 2012 with an investment of 57.69 billion yuan (about 8.48 billion U.S. dollars), according to Heilongjiang Provincial Development and Reform Commission.

Heilongjiang is just one of several Chinese provinces that have drafted detailed plans to boost grain production in their respective regions since July 2 when the State Council, China’s cabinet, approved a state mid- and long-term grain security plan that aims to keep the nation’s annual grain output above 500 billion kg by the year 2010 or raise production capacity beyond 540 billion kg a year by 2020.

Last month, the National Development and Reform Commission published the Outlines Regarding the State Mid- and Long-Term Grain Security Plan for 2008-2020 Period, reiterating the goal of stabilizing the country’s grain self-sufficiency rate above 95 percent and attaining a capability of producing 540 billion kg of grains by the year of 2020.

China’s prime grains include rice, wheat, maize, soybean, potatoes and pulses. The country produced 501.5 billion kg of grains last year, keeping a self-sufficiency rate 90 percent in grain supply as a result of large imports of soybean and maize.

A projection given by the National Development and Reform Commission has set the country’s total grain output at 525 billion kg this year.

But the country’s sufficiency has been threatened by a number of factors, including changing diets caused by rising affluence, industrialization, urbanization, population rise, which have caused a robust rise in grain consumption, and by decrease of farmland, shortage of water supply, and climate change, which had negative impact on grain production.

“The decrease of farmland and shortage of water supply and climate change have had an increasingly negative impact on grain production, and the grain supply and demand in China will be in a tight balance for a long period of time,” said an official from the National Development and Reform Commission.

Available arable land across China shrank to 122 million hectares in 2006, compared with 131 million hectares in 1996.

Increased urbanization has improved people’s lives, but it has also increased grain consumption. China’s population is expected to reach 1.45 billion people by 2020 and 1.5 billion in 2033, exerting more pressure on food security.

Li Maosong, a researcher with Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and also an expert on the grain issue, said the country had grain bumper harvest from 2003 through to 2007, with an increased grain output amounting to 44.5 billion kg, but agricultural disasters cut the country’s potential yields by 50 billion kg a year.

And the trend seems to get worse as time goes on, Li warned.

Heilongjiang, Henan, Jiangxi, Anhui and Jilin provinces have worked out detailed plans for grain output boost.

With some 2,000 rivers and lakes running through its territory, Heilongjiang is naturally well positioned for grain production. It produced 40 billion kg of grain last year and is expected to reap 42.4 billion kg this year. And 74 percent of the province’s grain are sold to the market.

In accordance with Heilongjiang’s Plan Regarding Safeguarding the State’s Grain Security Strategy, Heilongjiang will largely rely on upgrading low and moderate yield farmland to help boost its grain output target.

Yang Yuming, an official with the production section of Heilongjiang Agricultural Commission, said there were 6.93 million hectares of low and moderate yield farmland across the province.

“Heilongjiang will be blessed with 11.2 billion kg of grains if these farmland can be improved,” said Yang.

Jilin Province, a neighbor of Heilongjiang, is hoping to boost its grain output by 5 billion kg in five years through land reclamation.

Henan sets the grain output increase at 15 billion kg, Jiangxi 13.5 billion kg and Anhui 11 billion kg.

These five Chinese regions will have an added-up potential grain producing capacity of 54.5 billion kg, exceeding the state set grain output boost goal.

Up to now, only Jilin’s grain output boost plan, with a budget of 26 billion yuan, has been approved by the State Council.

Apart from the above mentioned five provinces, other key grain producing areas in the country — Hubei, Hunan, Shandong, Sichuan, Jiangsu provinces, and Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region — have also been busy working on new grain production plans.

Massive investments, as well as the spread of improved technologies — high-yield seeds, and better use of water, will play an important role in the country’s drive to attain self sufficiency goal in grain supply.

China increased spending on rural areas, agriculture and farmers by 30 percent from last year to 562.5 billion yuan this year.

Out of the central government’s 4 trillion yuan economic stimulus plan announced in early November, tens of billions will be flowing into improving infrastructure in the countryside, which will in turn be helpful in bolstering grain output.

Yin Xiaojian, deputy chief of the Rural Economy Institute with Jiangxi Provincial Academy of Social Sciences, said China would soon enter an era of buying grain security from the state coffers.

“The fact that the state will play a leading role in the massive investment campaign, supported by different localities, conforms with the state’s development strategy about subsidizing agriculture with industry or countryside being helped by cities, which is of great significance to safeguarding grain security, but also advancing progress of rural areas, agriculture and farmers as a whole,” said Yin.

Yin reckoned that parts of the grain-boost plans put forward by the five provinces were practical.

“If these provinces could implement the plans to the fullest extent, plus no output failure in other parts of the country, the state’s goal of securing an extra 40 billion kg of grain by the year 2020 could be within reach,” said Yin.

Farmers could benefit by the nation’s massive grain boosting drive too.

According to Heilongjiang’s plan, by the year of 2020, local farmers will see their per capita net income quadruple their standard of 4,132 yuan for 2007. (One U.S. dollar equals 6.8 yuan)

Housing prices in 70 large-and medium-sized Chinese cities fell 0.4 percent year-on-year in December, signaling the first such drop since the government issued the figure in July 2005.

It was down 0.5 percent compared with the previous month, according to a joint statement issued by the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Bureau of Statistics.

In November, property prices rose only 0.2 percent from a year earlier, presenting the lowest growth rate in the past three years.

About one third of the cities showed a year-on-year price drop, with southern Shenzhen leading the downward trend by a 18.1 percent dip. Housing prices in cities like Guangzhou, Nanjing and Chongqing all fell more than 5 percent.

Meanwhile, the prices in 50 cities dropped in December compared with the previous month. Southern Guangzhou led the drop by 3.1 percent.