Chinese Anxiety—In Debate About Overwork, a Glimpse...
TEA LEAF NATIONAlmost half of all Chinese report feeling “more anxiety” now than they did five years ago. What, exactly, is driving these concerns, or increasing reports of these concerns? Avid followers of China-related news might immediately think of censorship and other restrictions on...
Why Can’t China Make Its Food Safe?—Or Can It?
ALEX WANG, JOHN C. BALZANO, ISABEL HILTON (& authors)The month my wife and I moved to Beijing in 2004, I saw a bag of oatmeal at our local grocery store prominently labeled: “NOT POLLUTED!” How funny that this would be a selling point, we thought.But 7 years later as we prepared to return to the US, what was once a joke had...
Rat Meat Masquerading as Lamb—Yet Another Food Safety...
TEA LEAF NATIONRat meat + gelatin + red food coloring + nitrates = lamb. Have you tried it yet?“This is what a ‘complete’ sheep looks like,” reads a caption under the photoshopped image of a sheep with Jerry, the mouse from Tom and Jerry, as its head. The image was posted by...
The Long Battle Over “White Pollution”
TEA LEAF NATIONIn the past weeks, Chinese citizens have learned that the styrofoam boxes from which they eat their lunches will soon be legal. On February 16, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China’s highest economic policy-making body, changed the Industrial...
Bird Flu’s Latest Talons Force Fresh Defense
CAIXINA surprise attack by a new strain of the bird flu virus has forced Chinese authorities into the trenches for a two-pronged defense against unseen enemies.The primary threat is the deadly virus that scientists identified as a new strain of H7N9. It first surfaced in February in...
Bird Flu Fears: Should We Trust Beijing This Time?
DAVID WERTIME, YANZHONG HUANG, ISABEL HILTON (& authors)David Wertime:A new strain of avian flu called H7N9 has infected at least seven humans and killed three in provinces near the Chinese metropolis of Shanghai, with the first death occurring on March 4. Meanwhile, in the last month, about 16,000 pigs, 1,000 ducks, and a few swans...
Baby Milk Restrictions Cause Outrage in Mainland China
CHINADIALOGUEThe Hong Kong government’s recent listing of baby formula as a “reserved commodity” and a 1.8kg per person per day export limit has sparked widespread criticism—as well as becoming a hot topic at China’s annual session of parliament [the Lianghui, or “Two Meetings...
Pig Carcasses in Shanghai River Spawn Dark Humor on...
TEA LEAF NATIONThe Huangpu River usually appears in glamor shots of Shanghai, serving as scenic backdrop to the colonial splendor of the Bund or the modern marvel of the Pudong skyline. But of late, a more grim and distasteful association has emerged. As of March 12, almost 6,000 dead pigs have...
Poison Eaters of Gansu Province
CAIXINBarely any rainfall on a bone-dry landscape has always made crop farming in the province of Gansu a rough gamble between the sky and local irrigation policies. But now, farmers reap only sorrow from fields that experts say are severely contaminated with cadmium and other heavy...
China’s State-Run Media Shares Powerful Map of “...
TEA LEAF NATION, DAVID WERTIMEIt appears that Chinese environmental activism is going further mainstream. The Sina micro-blogging account of Global Times, a well-known Communist Party mouthpiece, has just shared news about the horrific proliferation of “cancer villages” in China. Earlier today...
Every Grain of Rice
FUCHSIA DUNLOPFuchsia Dunlop trained as a chef in China’s leading Sichuan cooking school and possesses the rare ability to write recipes for authentic Chinese food that you can make at home. Following her two seminal volumes on Sichuan and Hunan cooking, Every Grain of Rice is inspired by...
Garden of Lost Children
CAIXINIt started with a baby that was left in the doorway of a hospital bathroom. Yuan Lihai took in the girl with a cleft lip while working at a Henan province hospital in 1989. At the department of gynecology and obstetrics, she was paid 20 yuan for every infant she buried. This was...