As Christians around the world observe the annual World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation on September 1, Caritas Internationalis is joining Pope Francis in calling on all “to take bold steps in order to safeguard our common home, pray and act for building a community of solidarity and love.”
“As followers of Christ, we share a common role as stewards of God’s creation, our well-being is linked to the well-being of our mother earth,” said the humanitarian and development organisation of the Catholic Church in a statement on Monday.
“It is also a moment of renewing our hearts and minds, and in rebuilding our relationship with Mother Earth, we are restoring our relationship with God,” said the global confederation of 165 national Catholic relief and development agencies.
Drawing attention to the ravages borne by the world because of the Covid-19 pandemic, Caritas said, “we became aware of our shared human nature and how interconnected the political, economic, social, spiritual and cultural dimensions are.”
Covid-19 time to build solidarity
“We realised how unjust systems created the environment for the spread of diseases, how fragile our lives are, and how vulnerable we were before the virus.” The pandemic also became an “opportunity for us to joins hands to defend lives and ensure that we do not fall victims of the virus”, Caritas said, stressing, “It is also an opportunity for a new form of solidarity to emerge.”
As the globalised world got viral, Caritas said it continued to spread what its president, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle called the “pandemic of love and solidarity” around the globe.
Caritas said local communities that are victims of the failure to safeguard our common home are asking for “targeted and immediate action, especially concerning food security, access to water and ecosystem preservation.”
The worldwide charity federation thus called on all to protect and nurture life and ensure the sustainability of ecological, economic, social and political systems. In the post-Covid-19 phase, it said, “the new, just and sustainable ways of living” must be promoted, by making people aware of the interconnected relationship between the respect for the earth and ecological, economic, social and political ways of living.
Season of Creation
With the Day of Creation on 1 September, Christians all over the world will begin the month-long Season of Creation.
Ecumenical Patriarch Dimitrios I was the first to proclaim September 1 as a day of prayer for creation for Orthodox Christians in 1989. In fact, the Orthodox liturgical year begins on that day with a commemoration of how God created the world.
The World Council of Churches (WCC) was instrumental in extending the period from September 1 to October 4 as the Season of Creation. Christians worldwide have embraced this Season as part of their annual calendar.
Pope Francis, who in 2015 released his landmark encyclical, “Laudato Si’, on care of our common home”, that year led the Catholic Church in joining the ecumenical season.
The Season of Creation ends on October 4, the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of ecology, who is greatly loved by many Christian denominations. The WCC has chosen “Jubilee for the Earth” as the theme of this year’s Season of Creation. Dr. Louk Andrianos, WCC Consultant on the Care for Creation, Sustainability and Climate Justice explained the choice of the theme saying it is “to advocate for life sanctification and give rest to all Creation”.
Cardinal John Tong, the Apostolic Administrator of Hong Kong, has invited Christians to “revisit the notion of the culture of life”.
His invitation came in a message ahead of Pro-Life Day 2020, which this year coincides with the 25th anniversary of the promulgation of Pope St. John Paul II’s 1995 encyclical, Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life).
In the past seven months, noted Cardinal Tong, “the pandemic (Covid-19) has claimed the lives of over 810,000 persons and infected more than 23.5 million persons worldwide. This disaster drives us to reflect on the values and meaning of life and treasure them more.”
The encyclical, The Gospel of Life, is “meant to be a precise and vigorous reaffirmation of the value of human life and its inviolability, and at the same time, a pressing appeal addressed to each and every person, in the name of God: respect, protect, love and serve life, every human life!” said Cardinal Tong, citing Evangelium Vitae.
Cardinal Tong also explained that the fourth Pro-Life Day was postponed to 8 September, the feast of the Nativity of our Lady, because its original day – the feast of the Visitation – fell on 31 May 2020, which was also Pentecost Sunday.
Cardinal Tong noted that, at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, some countries adopted some policies and attitudes that treated the pandemic lightly – like the common flu or by handling it with the approach of “herd immunity.” These attitudes, he said, “devalued our vulnerable brothers and sisters,” caused us to “neglect our responsibility to care for our brothers and sisters properly,” and intensified the impact of “the culture of death.”
Contrasting this with the encyclical Evangelium Vitae, Cardinal Tong said that St. John Paul II invited us to contemplate the meaning of life, its greatness and fantasy, respecting that everyone has a right to life. This reflection should, in turn, lead us to “do good…love and care for others,” as the value of a person is not determined by any categories but “simply because he/she is a person irrespective of any disability or incapability.”
He hailed the sacrifice of many priests who, in spite of infection rates, continued to visit coronavirus patients often at the risk of getting infected themselves. They live our Jesus’s words, he said, “no one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15: 13).
Promoting a new culture of life
To foster a new culture of life, the Cardinal stressed on the importance of obeying God’s commandment: “Thou shall not kill.” Obedience to this commandment, he further explained, includes not being angry with our brother, preaching the Gospel of life and supporting “all the programmes, organizations and teachings that promote the values of life and serve the gospel of life.”
In this regard, human life is to be respected and treated as “a gift from God, sacred and inviolable” from conception to the time of natural death. Consequently, abortion and euthanasia are “absolutely unacceptable” as the value of life is based on giving and accepting love with the understanding that “the conjugal acts of married couples are oriented to the procreation of life.”
Important also is “the formation of conscience,” noted the Cardinal, especially as “our societies and mass media today are deeply influenced by ‘the culture of death.’” He pointed out more education needs to be done to nourish a “correct conscience” in the face of a culture that causes “confusion between good and evil, precisely in relation to the fundamental right to life.”
The role of family
Cardinal Tong highlighted the important role of family as a “sanctuary of life” and the place “where the couple welcomes a new life – the gift of God.”
The family is also a “place for daily individual and family prayers, to live out the gospel of life and for the special care of the elderly and the sick.” In these capacities, he noted, the family has an “indispensable role in fostering the culture of life.”
Science, technology in service of human life
Cardinal Tong said that science and technology can be used in the “service of human life and its integrity,” insisting that advancements in biotechnology need to be understood in order to be used “for the promotion and protection of life.”
In this regard, he acknowledged the role of the Bioethics Resource Center of the Holy Spirit Seminary College of Theology and Philosophy, the Diocesan Pastoral Commission for Marriage and Family, and Catholic schools which identify “life” as one of their core educational values. He also recommended the Creighton Model Fertility Care System for couples who are having difficulties in achieving pregnancies and natural family planning services for couples preparing to have children.
Pointing out that contemporary society is torn between a “culture of life” and a “culture of death”, Cardinal Tong called for critical thinking that is “capable of discerning true values and authentic needs” to build a culture of life.
In conclusion, he urged everyone to “love and respect every human life, walk forward patiently and courageously, to foster ‘the culture of life’ which is the fruit of truth and love.”
The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), the EU’s securities and markets regulator, has today published a document listing the thresholds above which shareholders can be identified in the various Member States of the European Union (EU).
The document contains information provided by national competent authorities setting out:
national thresholds for shareholder identification in Member States that have established such a threshold;
relevant national legislation and rules; and
indication of Member States where the revised Shareholder Rights Directive (SRDII) has not yet been transposed into national law.
ESMA drafted this document to enhance transparency around the regimes adopted across the EU.
The revised SRDII requires Member States to ensure that companies have the right to identify their shareholders. Member States may provide for companies having a registered office on their territory to be only allowed to request the identification of shareholders holding more than a certain percentage of shares or voting rights. Such a percentage shall not exceed 0,5 %.
Next steps
When ESMA receives notifications from Member States that information reflected in the document has changed, the document will be updated and republished on the website. However, there may be a small delay in making such updates. If any discrepancy is identified between the information in the document and legislation or rules published at national level, priority should therefore be given to the latter.
Northwest summers mean salmon on the grill. While Alaskans fill freezers with their own catch – our freezers are filled with enough salmon to last until next summer – those grilling elsewhere must buy either farm-raised salmon or wild sockeye salmon caught in Bristol Bay, Alaska.
These fish have been harvested by Alaska native peoples for thousands of years. Sockeye have been smoked, filleted, canned and frozen – and given, traded, sold and eaten – for generations.
But the fishermen, seafood processors and communities of Bristol Bay are under threat, and not for the first time. Bristol Bay carries painful memories of the 1918 Great Influenza, which devastated the local indigenous population. Now, the global economy has collapsed in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the market for seafood, often eaten at restaurants, has collapsed along with it.
In response to COVID-19, the state of Alaska imposed restrictions on the industry, including quarantines and social distancing mandates. Salmon processors have also imposed their own rules to keep workers restricted to company grounds.
All of this means the processors of Bristol Bay’s salmon catch face higher costs and lower retail prices. This has resulted in a dramatic 48% fall in prices paid to fishermen for their catch.
Fishermen, who must own or rent expensive permits to participate in harvesting, maintain boats and equipment and pay crew, face being forced out of the fishery.
In the late 19th century, commercial salmon fishing first drew fishermen to Bristol Bay from what Alaskans refer to as “Outside.” The fishing was first done via sailboat.
Seafood companies owned the boats, hired the crews and towed them to the fishing grounds, allowing the industry to restrict who fished and where. This control prevented overfishing and protected profits.
Seafood companies resisted modernization of the fleet until 1951, when the introduction of powerboats led to a new arrangement with fishermen, who at that point shifted to working more independently from the processing companies that handled cleaning, filleting and packaging the fish.
Disagreements about fishermen safety, unionization or cooperatives, and conflicts about prices have existed as long as the fishery. Fishermen, suspicious that processors were colluding to hold down prices, sued in the early 2000s. Though the lawsuit was settled, skepticism persisted.
Money for inside Alaska and Outside
Today, Alaskans make up about half the 2,500 fishermen who flock to catch sockeye in a Bristol Bay salmon run. Of the US$250 million of fish that was caught in 2018, fishermen who call the remote Bristol Bay area home took just under 20% of the money paid to fishermen, with the rest of the money going to other Alaskans or fishermen primarily from Washington, Oregon and California.
While fish are caught by a mix of Alaskans and fishermen from Outside, they are handled, cut and processed by a workforce that’s decidedly more geographically diverse, from places as far away as Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia. Just a handful of processing jobs are performed by local residents.
Average total individual wages – around $8,000 for the season – for processing workers are higher than the median monthly household income in Bristol Bay but may also include room and board and other compensation in the self-sufficient canneries that spring up in Bristol Bay during the season.
Overall fishing activity provides millions of dollars in tax revenue annually to the Bristol Bay region, which has a total population of only a few thousand people.
Bristol Bay has always faced challenges based on the uncertain size of runs and external market competition. However, the structure of the market started to change significantly with the start of salmon aquaculture in Norway, with fish not caught by independent fishermen but raised by farmers in pens.
Through selective breeding and domestication, by the early 2000s, farmed salmon had grown to surpass wild salmon in volume of harvest, and today farmed salmon are grown at 2.5 times the rate wild salmon are caught. This has been a part of the shift in volume to farmed salmon in the market.
The volume of farmed salmon is not limited by nature, but rather by regulatory regimes and the ability of farmers to find fertile ocean. Conversely, Bristol Bay is not a factory, and wild production is influenced by myriad natural factors, including climate change. The fishery is managed for sustainability, and therefore cannot respond to a growth in demand for fish by increasing production.
The growing market share of farmed salmon has put pressure on Bristol Bay producers and fishermen, so the fishermen are now working together to protect the value and reputation of their product. Producers aim to maintain the catch’s value by marketing the fact that Bristol Bay sockeye are sustainably managed and not just organic but one of the last true wild food sources.
Recent years have been good for the fishery as it has seen record runs and harvests. At the same time, wholesale prices remained high for much of the last several seasons as processors shifted away from canning and toward higher-quality products like fillets. Fishermen have also captured more value from their catch through various quality bonuses for bleeding and better handling of their catch.
Yet the average size of fish caught has been trending downwards, forcing producers to adjust the types of products that can be produced. Larger fish are generally more valuable, as they can be turned into more, and higher-quality, fillets.
Is it worth it?
Fishing for Bristol Bay salmon has always been tough, not least because making your living on these cold northern waters is risky and sometimes deadly. The development of farmed salmon added to the challenge, but the wild industry was adapting, as fishermen tend to do.
And then the pandemic arrived.
This year, communities are trying to protect public health and their economies in the face of the coronavirus. Fishers traveling from outside the state must test and quarantine, and processors have implemented comprehensive testing for their workers traveling in from out of state. Fishermen and processing-plant workers have not been uniformly compliant with health mandates from state and local governments for social distancing and mask wearing.
As the run came to an end in mid-August, there have been 87 non-Alaska resident and 16 Alaska resident cases of COVID-19 in the Bristol Bay region. This is in the context of calls from some members of the community to shut down the fishery in response to COVID-19. It is unclear if these were detected because of more stringent controls by the industry, or the result of the fishery opening.
Fishermen wonder if the all the trouble is even worth their time. The reduction in demand has resulted in a dramatic fall in prices, making fishermen question whether they will break even.
And this happens at a time when farmed salmon is an ever-growing part of the industry. It is an open question what the long-run impact of this season will be, but in 2020 the average sockeye fillet on the grill in the lower 48 comes with a long history of conflict, cooperation and courage.
Changing vineyard leaves in fall, Willamette Valley, Oregon
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Jarad Hadi was born in Clackamas, Oregon—southeast of the city of Portland. While growing up, his family spent time living in Paris, and he traveled throughout Europe and portions of the Middle East. His father introduced him to wine, which sparked a lifelong interest.
“When I turned 21, I decided that instead of buying it, I should try to make it. A neighbor had grape vines—I wouldn’t be able to tell you what sort—but I made my first wine in the basement from trial and error and reading books. I also had a job taking me to different countries, and was trying different wines.”
His life as a professional winemaker, however, was partially launched through poetry.
“A small publisher in Buenos Aires, Argentina, was going to publish a translation of my poetry book. Probably the most exciting point in my life.”
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Because Hadi was finishing studies and lacked funds, he needed money for his stay in South America. An Argentinian winery named Bodega Calle agreed to provide employment.
“That’s how I made my way down to this poetry book release—working for empanadas and a small stipend. It was great because they let me make wine on the side. That was important—I felt that hands-on learning was really big. You can work at a winery, but to understand the full picture, it’s interesting to make your own product. From that experience, my winemaking blossomed every year, every vintage.”
Back in the U.S., Hadi met Victoria Coleman of Lobo Wines of Napa Valley, California, as well as Michael Silacci of Opus One Winery. Both had had experiences in Bordeaux in France, and both encouraged Hadi to study there. He did so—graduating with a master degree in vineyard and winery management. He followed that with a stint of working with Chateau Pichon Longueville Comtesse in the Médoc region of Bordeaux.
Hadi then returned to North Plains, Oregon. He brought his new wife Giulia Schiavon—an Italian from Padova, located west of Venice (Giulia’s grandfather was a winemaker). He now manages a five-acre [2 hectare] parcel of his own vines (Grape Ink Wines) and produces 500 cases annually. He also consults for neighboring winemakers who own 45 acres [18 hectares] in northern Willamette Valley—including Mason Hill Vineyards, Eagles Nest Winery, Mason Ridge Farms, Lindas Vineyard and Highgrove Estate. When we recently spoke, Hadi explained the unique attractions of the region.
Jarad Hadi in vines in the Willamette Valley, Oregon
Grape Ink Wines
“Oregon and the Willamette Valley are in a cold climate region that can create wines of elegance: acid driven wines. But this also leaves you with creativity—there are still pioneering areas to look at within a region that has been established. We don’t have many families here beyond second generation wine growers.
“I found the Willamette one of few places that had attention for creating quality wines, but at the same time had space for new ideas. Although they found their voice producing great Pinot Noirs and more recently extraordinary Chardonnays rivaling those of Burgundy, the region is beginning to find its own identity after years of following Eurocentric tendencies. Producers are beginning to understand terroir not only as influence from soil, topography and climate but also their cultural interactions with the landscape. That’s led many to examine their own practices in vineyards and led the industry toward a sustainable revolution in adoption of organic, biodynamic and natural farming methods. The combination of these and other forces have been spicing up the diversity and quality of wines coming out of the valley. It’s exciting to dive into this together.
“Challenges here? You’re in the middle of nature. Mendoza, Argentina, was pretty barren. They planted most of their trees. Same in France—certain little areas are forests, and very controlled. Here—forests are everywhere. You wake up and there might be 50 elk in a pasture where you were going to plant a vineyard. The other day Giulia and I were trying to chase a deer out of a vineyard.
“Another challenge is climate. To make a quality wine you have to ride the line of being able to just ripen grapes each year. We have relatively dry summers, but if rains come at the wrong time, that’s difficult. You are always in this balancing act.
Vines in Tualatin Hills AVA, Oregon
Grape Ink Wines
“Another challenge is carving out something in the market place. A lot of customers were used to wines from Napa Valley—rich and opulent. Those styles were initially pushed in Oregon: big business Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays. Now people are looking to create more authentic wines in a cold climate area—wines to age with acidity, and with brighter styles—more vibrant, mineral driven. We’re trying to introduce people to a different style of palate. I want to taste where it’s from, feel the wind in the bottle, taste the struggles, difficulty or successes. Or else wine becomes a science experiment, and less an expression of terroir. But that niche market is still only a sliver, for those ready to understand that sort of wine.”
Hadi told of lessons from Bordeaux and Mendoza that apply to the Willamette Valley.
“In Mendoza what was important was learning traditional, rustic styles of winemaking techniques. To work with different sorts of materials in the cellar—using different vessels for fermentation. That’s something we’re now implementing a lot in Willamette—not just traditional stainless-steel tanks, but also concrete, amphorae, large wooden vats—and finding what that does to wine.
“In France, one important thing was finding more of an intuitive style of winemaking. The most important aspect of winemaking is not only looking at the ongoing project and analyzing it, but also designing wine while in the vineyard–thinking about the forthcoming wine while you are picking grapes, while you are considering the harvest date. This approach is confident about what sort of wine you are going to make from the vineyard—instead of what sort you are going to make in the cellar. Completely European mentality. It helps extraordinarily. In California and Oregon people are asking me about numbers, science, juice panels, brix and malic acid. Those can be your backup plan to help understand the health of grapes, but they can’t be your decision maker. Your palate has to be your guiding tool.”
Hadi chose to settle in the northernmost region of the Willamette Valley to find a wide variety of expressions for Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and a few mountain varieties. It has allowed him to ‘push varietal expression’ by farming well, picking at optimal times and allowing wines to age.
En Plein Air from Grape Ink summer catalog
Grape Ink Wine
“A huge focus of mine is to create wines that can last 100 years. Because, dinners in France at Academie des vins Ancienne in Paris—with bottles at least 50 to 100 years old—really sparked an interest in trying to create wines that could last forever.
“We’re looking at different varieties to experiment with for future climate change, and planting parcels strategically. One wine is Pinot Noir, Monduese from the Savoie [in France] and Trousseau from Jura. We’re looking at those outliers because they’re planted at high elevations in warmer areas. The blend is unique. Hasn’t been done here or anywhere else. Younger winemakers realize the Willamette Valley is a diverse landscape—not so singular that every site is going to produce world class Pinot Noir. That has to be removed from the vernacular because it’s not true; it’s too diverse of a landscape—different soil types and elevations and mode esprit, different winemakers who have different skill sets.”
Hadi also works with his wife Giulia to merge wine and art.
“She’s a painter and sculptor and I’m focused on wine. Trying to link it up was the idea of Grape Ink. I’ll create a wine, she’ll try it, and then create a painting. Or I’ll look at a painting and then try to create a wine based on what sort of emotions that paining brings out. This would be linked to textures of her paintings. A lot would be for summer releases because she paints bright and vibrant colors. The idea was to have that same sort of vibrancy come out through wines. Having characteristics that would bring out all three— white, rosé and red wines—and be able to evoke feelings of all three expressions—say Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris—in one bottle.”
Giulia Hadi of Grape Ink Wines works on art imagery for wine labels
Grape Ink Wines
Hadi actively promotes the recently created Tualatin Hills American Viticultural Area (AVA) appellation in the northernmost region of the valley—abutting the Colombia gorge.
“A lot of people tell me just to focus on my property. But I think it’s important to focus on everyone around also and help them out—because we’re going to need to do this together. I don’t think one producer can change a region. But if we group together, we have a good chance to show what we think is special.”
What advice would he give winemakers interested in moving to the region?
“The Willamette Valley is still very collaborative, so expect good friendships. Unique to the area? We are not looking at everyone as competitors, but as collaborators. Important to people coming here—or to any region—is not to work off anecdotal knowledge, not just listen to what the neighbors tell you—but to pay attention to what you feel, what you know, what you can specialize in. And for anyone coming to a new region, it will be nice to see them bring something innovative and new.”
Jarad and Giulia will soon be parents—grounding their union and marrying their lives even closer to Willamette Valley. As their own parents and grandparents sparked their mutual interests in wine, no doubt they will one day do alike—but also adding lessons learned from working in a different hemisphere, as well as from living on other continents.
Local military commanders from the two countries were meeting along the disputed frontier on Monday to resolve the issues, India’s defense ministry said. It said India was committed to dialogue “but is also equally determined to protect its territorial integrity.”
The statement said China’s People’s Liberation Army on Saturday night “carried out provocative military movements to change the status quo” and “violated the previous consensus arrived at during military and diplomatic engagements” to settle the standoff in the cold-desert region.
In Beijing, foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said border forces were communicating over recent matters but gave no details.
“Chinese border troops always act in strict compliance with the Line of Actual Control, and have never crossed the line for any activities,” Zhao told reporters at a daily briefing.
India’s defense ministry issued its statement after a gap of a day and did not give details of the nature of the new incident.
The statement said Indian troops “undertook measures to strengthen our positions and thwart Chinese intentions to unilaterally change facts on ground.”
It said the activity took place on the southern bank of Pangong Lake, a glacial lake divided by the de facto frontier between the rivals and where the India-China face off began in early May on the lake’s northern flank.
Indian military experts said the latest incident occurred in Chushul sector, where the two sides were generally respecting each other’s positions.
“We never had any problem in this place and we hold it pretty strongly,” said Lt. Gen. D.S. Hooda, who served as the Indian military’s northern commander. “After relative calm, China has suddenly opened a fresh, brand new front. It’s a huge provocation.”
India unilaterally declared Ladakh a federal territory and separated it from disputed Kashmir in August 2019, ending its semi-autonomous status and straining the already prickly relationship between New Delhi and Beijing. China was among the countries to strongly condemn the move, raising it at international forums including the U.N. Security Council.
According to some Indian and Chinese strategic experts, India’s move exacerbated existing tensions with China, leading to the deadly June border clash.
The disputed and undemarcated 3,500-kilometer (2,175-mile) border between India and China, referred to as the Line of Actual Control, stretches from the Ladakh region in the north to the Indian state of Sikkim. The two Asia giants fought a border war in 1962 that also spilled into Ladakh and ended in an uneasy truce. The two countries have been trying to settle their border dispute since the early 1990s, without success.
The ongoing standoff high in the Karakoram mountains is over disputed portions of a pristine landscape that boasts the world’s highest landing strip, a glacier that feeds one of the largest irrigation systems in the world, and a critical link to China’s massive “Belt and Road” infrastructure project.
The face off began at three places. Soldiers at Pangong Lake ignored repeated verbal warnings, triggering a yelling match, stone-throwing and even fistfights. By June it escalated and spread north in Depsang and Galwan Valley, where India has built an all-weather military road along the disputed frontier.
On June 15, the troops engaged in a nighttime clash in Galwan that was the deadliest conflict in 45 years between the nuclear-armed rivals.
According to Indian officials, Chinese troops atop a ridge at the mouth of the narrow valley threw stones, punched and pushed Indian soldiers down the ridge at around 4,500 meters (15,000 feet), leaving 20 Indians dead, including a colonel. China did not report any casualties.
Accusing each other of instigating the violence, both sides pledged to safeguard their territory but also to try to end the standoff that dramatically changed the India-China relationship.
Several rounds of military and diplomatic talks on ending the crisis have been unsuccessful.
In Ladakh, the Buddhist organizations celebrated the removal of Article 370 provisions and making the Ladakh region a separate Union Territory. The people in Leh and Matho celebrated 15 August as a day of “independence from Kashmir” and welcomed their Union Territory status.
EU-China relations have reached a phase of ‘co-opetition’, in which the EU has identified China at the same time as a cooperation and negotiating partner, economic competitor, and systemic rival. The most recent EU-China Summit on 22 June, which took place through video conference, clearly exemplified a more tense relationship, without a joint statement being released.
Without being naive, the EU may not be in a position to linger for too long, given China’s particular economic and geo-political importance. It is key for the EU to make its 27 Member States speak on China with one voice, especially during these challenging post-COVID-19 times. In a dialogue with Istvan Ujhelyi MEP, Vice-Chair of the European Parliament’s Committee on Transport and Tourism, we discuss the future of EU-China Relations.
Challenging times ahead
The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic has had a major influence on our daily life and will surely affect the international community and EU-China relations on the short, middle and long term. This moment is of utmost importance to determine the future direction of EU-China relations. It is far from a great secret that there is no single EU stance, or even a clear and obvious position within the main institutions of the European Union on what its redefined position should be based, or whether repositioning is necessary at all. No single country around the globe is able to manage the new types of challenges we are facing, such as global warming or outbreaks of new pandemics like COVID-19, in which a world order based on cooperation instead of division is to be pursued.
There is a great division in the European Parliament on China and EU-China relations between and within the political groups. However, Europe and China need each other as stable partners in this increasingly unstable global political arena. While both partners’ relations with the US are becoming more tense, China still emerges as a natural partner. The EU and China share the interest to maintain a well-balanced relationship based on cooperation, trust and reciprocity. However, simultaneously there is a growing political need in given EU Member States and political groups to determine how the EU can find a sensitive balance between protecting its strategic economic interests while deepening its cooperation with global partners, especially in harder policy fields such as trade and technology. There is a major debate ongoing within the European Parliament on the question of 5G, artificial intelligence, human rights, and minorities.
Nevertheless, there are numerous areas which could serve as a basis for enhanced inter alia cooperation, such as the fight against global warming and increased action against global terrorism. For instance, the EU’s green ambitions and fight against climate change, manifested in the Green Deal, are engaging the EU and China as neutral partners in a well-established bilateral partnership, also at the multilateral level.
Yet, as the old saying goes, every coin has two sides, as exemplified by the most recent (online) EU-China Summit. The fact that there was no joint statement was neither the best possible outcome, nor political message. However, as President von der Leyen clearly stated afterwards, the summit was only the starting point of a further process requiring greater reciprocity and trust. As this was the von der Leyen-Michel-Borrell trio’s first EU-China Summit, amidst a global health and economic crisis, in an extremely turbulent global political environment, it is fair to say that a great number of areas have been addressed properly. In particular international trade, climate change, international peace and security, in addition to COVID-19 responses.
The relationship with China is multifaceted and greatly depends on the policy area. The same ally can be a “cooperation partner” in addressing climate change, while also being in parallel, a “systemic rival” when it comes to political systems. However, enhanced cooperation is the only way to properly address global challenges. A significant milestone in trade policy could be reached by the end of 2020, if an adequate level of political will is provided by both sides to conclude the negotiations of the EU and China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI).
Can the EU speak on China with one voice?
This being a well-known criticism, the treaties provide the EU with limited competences and room for manoeuvre in the field of foreign policy, besides the challenges provided by the currently applied decision-making process in the Council. This is especially the case when the interests of one given Member State clash with the EU’s position represented by the rest of the Member States, leaving the EU to act too little or too late in the field of foreign affairs. The EU’s (in)capability to speak with one voice is not a China specific issue, but there is an urgent and pressing need for a stronger and more united EU voice. However, it is up to the Member States to realise this and act upon it. China’s relation with any of the EU Member States must be based on transparency and trust across governments and political forces in order to be mutually beneficial in the long term.
Global challenges such as terrorism, global warming or the current Covid-19 crisis know no border, culture, religion, race, or ethnicity. Due to the nature of these threats, solutions are to be based on cooperation, multilateralism and solidarity. Understanding each other’s culture and history remains the key to building long-term relationships and developing healthy and balanced societies. People-to-people cooperation should therefore be further strengthened, as partnership in the fields of science, culture, education and tourism (a sector majorly hit by the pandemic) could lead to enhanced mutual understanding, with spill-over effects in more sensitive hard policy issues such as trade or economics. Bridges should also be built on a personal level, both through bottom-up and top-down approaches in order to advance common objectives. Another key sector of cooperation is connectivity. In 2015 the Joint EU-China Connectivity Platform was established to further strong and mutually beneficial relations in the area of transport, and to enhance synergies between for example the EU’s Trans-European Transportation Network and China’s Belt and Road Initiative, while serving as a tool for enhanced transparency, reciprocity and an ensured level playing field in the transport industry, focusing on low-emission transport technologies and solutions, especially in boosting transportation over land.
Every global superpower is eager to increase its regional and global influence by combining different tools and assets. China’s attempts to gain greater influence manifests itself in many forms, including cultural diplomacy, strategic investments and infrastructure development projects (through the Belt and Road Initiative), and stepping up their efforts in establishing English-language media outlets. China and the EU need a balanced relation, based on trust, friendship, and reciprocity, especially in these current turbulent times. EU Member States are growing increasingly wary of Chinese economic influence, while Brussels also needs to protect its own strategic companies, sectors and European manufacturers. China should, however, refrain from trying to play Member States against each other, as despite the challenging times ahead, China and the EU remain natural partners above systemic rivals.
Interview with MEP Istvan UJHELYI
By Lin Goethals, Programme Director at the European Institute for Asian Studies (EIAS) in Brussels, in collaboration with the Center for European Studies at the Shanghai Institute of Social Sciences.
Following a high-level meeting with representatives of Member States hosted by WHO/Europe and the Ministry of Health, Italy, on schooling during the COVID-19 pandemic
Joint statement by Dr Hans Henri P. Kluge, WHO Regional Director for Europe and Roberto Speranza, Minister of Health of Italy
31 August 2020
Our communities continue to deal with many uncertainties brought by the new COVID-19 reality. Following the initial phase of the pandemic, we have been able to ease lockdown measures and develop a more sophisticated understanding about how we can remain safe.
With caution, we are reopening societies and as we do so, we must explore how to safely reopen schools for our children.
COVID-19 has created the largest disruption of education systems in history, affecting nearly 1.6 billion learners in more than 190 countries, and our region is no exception. Most countries in the Region closed schools to assist with the containment of the virus. While this was vital, as we transition to reopening, we must now determine how to open schools in the Region, safely.
School closures can have a profound effect on the health and well-being of children
Although children can contract and transmit COVID-19, they have largely been spared from the direct health effects of the virus, with most cases of COVID-19 in children being mild or asymptomatic. Despite this, they continue to be negatively impacted by school closures, both in terms of their education and their health – including their mental health, social development and the risk and impact of being in an abusive home environment.
The vulnerable and deprived carry the heaviest burden of school closures
The harmful effects of the pandemic have not been distributed equally. Children living in vulnerable situations continue to be disproportionately affected in relation to their long-term health outcomes and challenges with distance learning, both due to digital poverty and difficulties for parents being able to assist in the learning process.
Challenges in accessing educational support have also been more profound for children with underlying health conditions and children living with disabilities.
Addressing these disparities must be central to any efforts to reopen schools safely.
Today we met to find a way forward
We recognize that many parents, educators and children themselves have several concerns and anxieties about going to school during these times. So, today we met virtually with representatives of Member States to develop a framework to ensure the safety and well-being of children, their families and communities. We would like to reconfirm that our discussions are guided by the best interests of the child and overall public health considerations, informed by cross-sectoral and context-specific evidence.
Measures to be considered
We agreed that there is a wide array of measures that can be considered for risk reduction in school settings and propose the following considerations:
Protective measures relating to hand hygiene, physical distancing, use of masks where appropriate, and staying at home if sick are cornerstones of safe schooling within the COVID-19 reality.
Specific policies will need to be in place for at-risk children with special learning needs or health conditions, as well as for educators with health conditions that render them vulnerable to more severe infection.
It is realistic to prepare and plan for online learning to be available to complement school-based learning in the coming scholastic year. This will be necessary during temporary closures, can be an alternative for children and educators with health conditions, may be needed during episodic quarantine and may complement school-based learning in circumstances where children alternate school presence to respect physical distancing needs in smaller classrooms.
The important link between health and education sectors will continue to grow as we navigate the new post-COVID-19 reality. We are committed to working across sectors to meet the needs of children.
Our commitment
In placing the issue of schooling during the COVID-19 pandemic on the top of our agenda, we are indeed showing that we want to ensure that children and adolescents are not left behind as the world continues to grapple with this pandemic. We commit to:
building a coalition across our Member States to inform our actions and move forward jointly to implement the best possible measures on the provision of safe schooling for all, including our children;
agreeing to a unified set of data to learn more about the impact of COVID-19 on children, their families and communities to better inform future policy;
preserving equity as a core guiding principle to ensure underserved populations are not further disadvantaged.
We also sincerely appreciate the tireless efforts of teachers and parents who have preserved childhood and, despite the obstacles, provided children with access to ongoing learning, and our health workers who continue to keep our communities safe.
Following this meeting, our focus is to deliver to our citizens a feasible and realistic framework for managing the reopening of schools.
We cannot let children become the hidden victims of this pandemic by denying them the opportunities they so fundamentally deserve.
Turkey‘s Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu on Aug. 30 spoke to EU’s foreign policy chief over the phone over latest developments in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Çavuşoğlu and Josep Borrell discussed regional developments amid heightened tensions between Greece and Turkey over energy exploration, according to diplomatic sources.
Greece has disputed Turkey’s current energy exploration in the Eastern Mediterranean, trying to box in Turkish maritime territory based on small islands near the Turkish coast.
Turkey- the country with the longest coastline on the Mediterranean- has sent out drilling ships to explore for energy on its continental shelf, saying that both Turkey and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) have rights in the region.
The 27th edition of the Beijing International Book Fair (BIBF), which would have taken place at the China International Exhibition Center from August 26 to August 30, kicked off its virtual version last week.
The first phase of a year-long “Smart BIBF,” programming began August 26 with the launch of Smart Rights Link and the BIBF Global Reading Festival. More than 1,000 exhibitors from 68 countries have registered for Smart Rights Link and uploaded more than 23,000 titles. Some 400,000 titles are expected to be available through the platform, which will remain operational until December 31. Online meetings for rights negotiations can be arranged until October 26. Smart BIBF also offers three business-matchmaking round tables—China-Asia, China-Europe, and China-America—that will take place on September 28, 29, and 30, respectively.
The Global Reading Festival, meanwhile, provides free livestreamed events from more than 100 publishing houses and cultural institutions from around the world, including the British Library on its classic collection.
In recent years, the U.K. has had the biggest overseas contingent at BIBF, and this has not changed with the virtual fair: more than 53 U.K. companies have registered and 1,200 titles uploaded for rights negotiation. The fair also boasts 97 new exhibitors, including 10 publishers from Latin America—including AZ Editora (from Argentina), Amanuense (Uruguay), and Somplemente (China)—as well as those from Armenia and Cape Verde. For these new exhibitors, the savings on airfares and accommodations, in addition to having the convenience of a virtual platform, are the major attractions.
Signs of Book Sales Improvement
As the virtual fair began, industry professionals were also watching results of China’s first major shopping festival of the year. Organized by JD.com, China’s second-largest e-commerce company, the 618 Shopping Festival, which ran from June 1 to June 18 (hence the name “618”), is a significant barometer on consumer spending and confidence.
Compared to the previous festival, sales of children’s books and educational titles for elementary and middle schools went up 43% and 40%, respectively. Sales of translated titles increased 57% while e-books experienced a huge sales boost. The Chinese edition of DK Natural History: The Ultimate Visual Guide to Everything on Earth was the #1 title on the bestseller list, which also saw Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret and a 40-volume Detective Sherlock Holmes illustrated series for primary school student among the top 10. As for e-books, the Harry Potter Complete Series dominated the sales chart.
In the January-June 2020 period, book sales via online channels went up 17.9% while sales at bricks-and-mortar bookstores declined 31.7% compared to the same period in the previous year, according to Centrin Ecloud, a Shanghai-based big-data platform for China’s publishing industry. The report showed indications that bookstore sales were improving, with data for May and June showing that sales at physical bookstores were at 80% (or above) of pre-pandemic levels.
Two categories showed the biggest year-on-year growth during the January–June period: sales of picture books rose 69.4% and sales of children’s encyclopedia/reference titles at 42.95%. The growth in these categories was directly attributed to the closure of kindergartens, parks, and libraries throughout the country, which boosted more parent-child reading activities at home. But with classroom education shifting to online during the Covid-19 outbreak, sales of textbooks and supplementary materials dropped significantly. The postponement of various examinations also affected the sales of test guides and exam preparation materials.
The Centrin report noted that only 42,763 new titles entered the Chinese book market during the first six months of 2020, marking a 27.7% decline compared the the same period last year. This was mostly due to publishers’ delaying new releases in light of the uncertainties caused by the pandemic and the resulting economic slowdown. The next six months, the report stated, will see Chinese publishers accelerating their programs to make up for the time (and revenue) lost.
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