A number of single-storey tin-sheeted and wooden houses were severely damaged in a No 3 alarm fire in Hang Tau, Sheung Shui.

My latest complaint is with news accounts of the PRC trade balance numbers. OK, yes the trade surplus went down a lot, but everyone who doesn't live in a cave understands that a lot of this has to do with the snowstorms. Is there a general shrinking of the trade gap due to a slow […]

Hot off the presses:

CHINESE beverage giant Wahaha Group has rejected a new cooperation plan put forward by French food group Danone, saying the ongoing peace negotiation is hard to continue, Wahaha said on Sunday. Danone proposed the two companies merge all their businesses to form a new company that will eventually be listed on the […]

The Road Safety Campaign Committee is inviting people to join a road safety show on March 30 to set a new Guinness World Record for the world's largest road safety symbol.

The China Digital Times reports that in a telephone memo, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television has banned media in China under its authority from having anything to do with Tang Wei, the actress who starred in "Lust,…

Just read a UBS report yesterday on China macro issues. The article was written by Jonathan Anderson back in mid-February. Sorry I can't link to it – not public info.
Anyway, Anderson was talking about RMB revaluation, but as part of that discussion went into some detail about inflation. He said, in […]

This will no doubt sound ignorant, stupid, or worse, but that's never stopped me before. From the Washington Post:

OVER THE past few years, China — budding superpower that it is — has repeatedly objected to international interventions in its domestic affairs. This complaint contributed to the suspension of official human rights dialogues with the United […]

With respect to this issue:

A few weeks ago, I wrote the post Notice: Chinese F Visas Cannot Be Renewed Past Olympics, and apparently I was wrong.
Over the last 10 days or so, I have been fielding emails, Skypes, and phone calls from friends and readers about the pain in the butt that has become their […]

I gave yet another presentation yesterday morning. Seems like I'm doing one of these a week recently. This one was an in-house training thing for a client and it covered commercial contracts issues like warranties, damages, indemnification, limitations on liability – that sort o' stuff – with a focus on the PRC law position of […]

A labor dispute reportedly caused by a reduction of workers' salaries has arisen at Casio's Guangzhou factory.

The link is here. UPDATE March 11, 2008: This is not the actual full text of the report as delivered; it's a truncated version. The full text should be available after the NPC meeting is over.