A customer shops for vegetables in Colombo. Sri Lanka's economic crisis has made many families think twice about buying fuel or food. (ERANGA JAYAWARDENA / AP) HONG KONG – Hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic and rising oil and food prices, Asia is experiencing a wave of inflation that will hurt livelihoods and the economy, […]
A nurse fills a syringe with the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 coronavirus vaccine at a vaccination center in Seoul on March 20, 2021. (JUNG YEON-JE / POOL / AFP) TOKYO / DHAKA / BANGKOK / NEW DELHI / SEOUL / WELLINGTON / VIENTIANE- South Korea approved its first domestically developed COVID-19 vaccine, manufactured by SK bioscience Co […]
People sit under the Cheongdam Bridge near the waters of the Han River in Seoul on June 10, 2022. (ANTHONY WALLACE / AFP) SEOUL – South Korea's one-person households are estimated to reach nearly 40 percent of the total households in 2050 due to low births and an aging population, government data showed on Tuesday. […]
A man with his handkerchief on his head walks across an intersection in Tokyo, June 27, 2022. The Japanese government warned of possible power shortages Monday in the Tokyo region, asking people to conserve energy as the country endures an unusually intense heat wave. (HIRO KOMAE / AP) TOKYO – Japan baked under scorching temperatures […]
The Bayswater Power Station, a coal-powered thermal power station is pictured near Muswellbrook in the Hunter Valley, Australia on Nov 2, 2021. (MARK BAKER / AP PHOTO) CANBERRA – Australia's greenhouse gas emissions increased in 2021, government data has revealed. According to the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory update for December 2021, which was published on […]
Thousands of South Korean truck drivers staged a fourth day of strikes on June 10, causing widespread disruptions and straining already-tight supply chains in an early test for the country's newly-elected president. (YONHAP / AFP) SEOUL – A strike by South Korean truckers has cost key industrial sectors more than $1.2 billion in lost production […]
File photo shows the morning view of the Lujiazui area in Pudong, East China's Shanghai. (PHOTO / XINHUA) Those observing that foreign companies are leaving China to support the claim that China's economy is declining are doing so despite the evidence to the contrary. The outward flow of some low added-value production elements and economic […]
Few people will dispute that mobility in the job market is but a highly normal phenomenon, and employees are to a greater or lesser extent guided by rational motivations to look for greener pastures, in addition to their own career aspirations. For decades in the city of Hong Kong, such join-and-quit behavior was only common […]
A farmer harvests wheat in Nanyang city, China's Henan province, May 22, 2022. (PHOTO / XINHUA) With the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine and the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, now in its third year, global grain prices are rising dramatically, which is a harbinger of a possible food crisis worldwide. At this […]
With nearly 110,000 novel coronavirus infections reported each day on average over the past week in the United States, six times that of the same period last year, the once clamorous voices in the country ridiculing China's dynamic clearing policy as inhuman, unscientific and ineffectual have become muted, as it is the US' hands-off approach […]
(JIN DING / CHINA DAILY) College graduates in China will face some unprecedented challenges this year in finding a job due to the imbalance between job opportunities and the number of candidates. The number of youths graduating from college this year is likely to be about 10.76 million, 1.67 million more than last year. Add […]
During the COVID-19 pandemic, youngsters’ screen time increased exponentially as they had to attend online classes frequently. In addition to that, video calls have also become the only possible way to get in touch with families and friends outside the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. As a result, myopia (more commonly known as shortsightedness or […]
China had been applauded by the World Health Organization for its success in beating COVID-19 when China ended the largest cordon sanitaire in Wuhan in the history of humanity. We published our manuscript titled “The end of cordon sanitaire in Wuhan: a wake-up call for the world” in 2020 in the official journal of the […]
Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison, center, works at a barbecue, colloquially known as a sausage sizzle, along with Liberal candidate for Pearce Linda Aitken while electioneering in Perth, Friday, May 20, 2022. (MICK TSIKAS / AAP Image via AP) With roughly one million Australians of Chinese heritage living and working in Australia, the Chinese vote […]
This photo taken on May 10, 2022 shows a general view of Manila from the business district of Makati. (CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN / AFP) Southeast Asia is on track to recover from nearly two years of recession, as increased mobility, border reopening and increased exports are seen supporting economic growth for the rest of the year, […]
Street vendors sell lemons along a road in Ahmedabad on May 1, 2022. (SAM PANTHAKY / AFP) NEW DELHI – Inflation continues to climb in India as people feel the pinch, driving an increase in savings amid forecasts of further spikes in food prices and other essential items. WPI three-decade high According to the latest […]
Having already lasted for nearly three months, and with no sign of easing, the increasingly serious baby formula shortage in the United States has at last prompted US President Joe Biden to act. He met with retailers and manufacturers on Thursday last week to discuss ways to increase supplies and restock, and he has ordered […]
Passengers wait in line before moving onto their temporary housing for quarantine as they come out of an arrival gate for international flights at the Narita International Airport in Narita, east of Tokyo, on Dec 2, 2021. (HIRO KOMAE / FILE / AP) SEOUL / HANOI / SINGAPORE / JERUSALEM / TOKYO / WELLINGTON / CANBERRA / MANILA – […]
A man shops at a supermarket in Foster City in California, the United States, April 12, 2022. (PHOTO / XINHUA) The US Federal Reserve recently raised its benchmark interest rate by half a percentage point, shifting the target range to 0.75 percent to 1 percent, following a smaller increase in March. It was the Fed's […]
People wearing face masks walk through the Shibuya scramble crossing in Tokyo, Japan, Jan 21, 2021. (ZHANG XIAOYU / XINHUA) TOKYO – Japan's household spending fell in March for the first time in three months, though the 2.3 percent drop was smaller than expected, as consumers remained cautious despite some easing of COVID-19 curbs. With […]
A farmer checks paddy in his rice field on the outskirts of Gauhati, India, April 30, 2022. (ANUPAM NATH / AP) Export prices of rice from India rose this week on increasing demand from Asia and Africa, while dwindling supplies of the staple lifted Vietnamese rates. Top exporter India's 5 percent broken parboiled variety was […]
People participate in a rally during a global day of action on climate change in Sydney on Nov 6, 2021. (STEVEN SAPHORE / AFP) CANBERRA – A majority of Australians want the government to do significantly more to reduce carbon emissions, a poll has found. According to data published by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on […]
In this photograph taken on April 27, 2022, children of laborers working in a brick kiln, goes to a nearby school in Dolike village on the outskirts of Jalandhar in India's Punjab state. (MONEY SHARMA / AFP) NEW DELHI – Indian financial consultant Waqar Khan has seen his income drop by about a fifth since […]
Presidential candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr greets supporters during a proclamation rally in Laoag city, Ilocos Norte province, north of Manila on March 25, 2022. (TED ALJIBE / AFP) MANILA – Philippine presidential aspirant Ferdinand Marcos Jr. continues to lead the race, according to a survey released Monday, one week before the May 9 elections. A […]
Data released recently by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that the consumer price index in the United States jumped 8.5 percent in March over the same period last year, a record high in 40 years, while the producer price index also rose at a faster pace. US President Joe Biden blamed the high […]
Commuters wearing face masks wait for their trains at a subway station in Seoul, South Korea on Feb 23, 2022. (AHN YOUNG-JOON / AP) TOKYO / HANOI / SINGAPORE / PHNOM PENH / SEOUL / KUALA LUMPUR / MANILA – Concerns mounted here over South Korea's decision to lift all anti-COVID-19 measures as the "non-scientific" decision can give […]
A worker harvests oil palm fruits at a plantation in Kutamakmur, Aceh, Indonesia on Sep 24, 2021. (AZWAR IPANK / AFP) JAKARTA – Indonesia, the world's top palm oil producer, announced plans to ban exports of the most widely used vegetable oil on Friday, in a shock move that could further inflame surging global food […]
(JIN DING / CHINA DAILY) The process of economic globalization that intensified from the 1980s onwards caused significant changes in the world’s economic landscape. Over the past 40 years, the formerly industrialized countries of the West have experienced strong de-industrialization, while the previously predominantly agricultural countries in East and Southeast Asia have become important industrial […]
Students inoculated with a dose of 'Corbevax' vaccine wait inside a classroom for observation, during a vaccination drive held for children in the age group of 12-14, as a preventive measure against COVID-19 coronavirus disease in Bangalore on March 30, 2022. (MANJUNATH KIRAN / AFP) NEW DELHI / SEOUL / WELLINGTON – India's tally of […]
Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison attends a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra on April 10, 2022. (STR / AFP) SYDNEY – Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison's government could lose the federal election to be held on May 21, according to polls on Monday, even as they showed him consolidating his position as the […]