I’m sure that all SACU members will join me in welcoming the steps taken by both Britain and China to improve their relationship recently. Foreign Secretary David Lammy met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing and with representatives of the business community in Shanghai. Then, at the G20 Summit in Brazil, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer met with Chinese President Xi Jinping. China’s Ambassador to the United Kingdom Zheng Zeguang has said, “We stand ready to work with the UK side to follow up on the common understanding between the two leaders, and enhance dialogue, communication, and collaboration wherever possible.” A press release from the British side talked of a shared pledge to “work together in pursuit of global stability, economic co-operation, and the clean energy transition”.
There have of course been predictable sceptical reactions from some areas of the popular ( populist?) press in Britain. But let’s not dwell on the negatives. There are overwhelming rational reasons why an improved friendship between Britain and China makes common sense. After ten years of living in Beijing, my view is that if we can move past distrust, our two countries are uniquely placed to complement each other in significant co-operation.
Zheng Zeguang
This is a partnership which the world needs to work. With the imminent arrival of a climate-sceptic President Trump and a policy of ‘drill, baby, drill’, it will take the closest possible Green co-operation between our two countries to keep the world on track to net zero. In nothing are the peoples of Britain and China so close as their shared love of nature and the environment. I’m writing this from a bench in one of the parks in the centre of Beijing and the scene around me could just as easily be Richmond or St James in London. There is the potential to transform this grassroots sustainable thinking into climate change policies with global significance. In emerging fields such as green technologies and sustainable development, there is enormous potential for collaboration between the two nations. As the world prioritises the transition to a low-carbon economy, the UK and China both have much to gain from sharing their expertise. The UK’s leadership in climate finance and environmental innovation, combined with China’s massive scale in green technology manufacturing, presents opportunities for further co-operation.
Education is another area of potential growth. China is moving from a manufacturing to an innovation economy. Over the course of my headship in Beijing, I have seen a definite upward trend in students selecting arts and humanities university level courses- and without exception in the UK. Further more this year, and for the first year ever, there will be zero applications to American universities. I’m very proud that (without any undue influence from me) a student has chosen my hometown Bournemouth University to follow his passion to study Media and Film. Much as I love my hometown, I can’t claim that as a university it is a world beater for academic research, but I know it will provide this young man with exactly the right mix of creative skills and knowledge to launch an excellent career in the burgeoning creative industries sector in China.
However, a word of warning. In order to normalise ties and achieve the ‘consistent, durable, respectful’ relationship talked of by Sir Keir, Britain is going to have to give up any thoughts of ‘exceptionalism’ and ‘special relationships’. We need to learn the lessons of history. In 1637 the first Englishman to reach China, Captain John Weddell, turned up in Macao, demanding all sorts of concessions for the Courteen company that he represented, only to be reduced to signing a declaration that he would not return to China for at least two years. And later of course, in 1793 the Macartney Embassy was dismissed by the Qianlong Emperor, who declined all requests for preferential trading relationships.
Learning from these imperialistic mistakes, I hope that modern day diplomats and negotiators understand that China is absolutely serious when it talks about a ‘multipolar’ world. This has concrete expression in the ‘一带一路, Yīdài Yīlù’, Belt and Road Initiative. I see this project as a scaling up of the initiatives that have lifted China out of relative poverty in the decades since the 1950’s. All across China, physical infrastructure in the form of transport links and digital infrastructure, in the form of internet technology, have empowered local communities to enrich themselves through being able to access wider and deeper markets.
An enhanced commercial rail network from Ganzhou to Duisburg in Germany, has sprouted new business opportunities in countries all along its route. The railway reduces transportation times from two months at sea to 25 days by train. The railway now connects 217 cities in 25 European countries directly to China, massively increasing export business opportunities.
Knowledge is also part of this multipolar infrastructure. Over the last three years, China has sent more than 500 scientific and agricultural experts to Africa and provided nearly 9,000 training opportunities to farmers there. In Morocco, China has worked with local investors to open the Kenitra electric battery gigafactory, bringing 2,300 new jobs.
Healthcare is another way in which China is sharing knowledge and expertise to empower economic activity around the world. As China has found, a healthier population is a more productive population. In Peru for example, co-operation between the two countries has just resulted in the opening of a new hospital, which has brought modern, comprehensive health services to a whole region of the country, which had previously lacked such infrastructure.
We know what the cynics will say, that this is just a way for China to exercise influence in the world. Threatened by changes to the world economy which previously worked exclusively in their favour, some in the West fail to see the new opportunities here for all. If a train arrives in Europe full of cheaper Chinese made EV cars, then the opportunity is clearly there for the same train to go back to China laden with products from all over Europe, including Britain, if we so choose, to middle class consumers across China, whose numbers continue to rise. My regular weekly shop here in Beijing now includes ‘Westminster Farmhouse Cheddar’ made in Somerset, presumably transported to China by rail and whose sales are contributing to local and national economies in Britain. The sobering fact is that attempts by London or Washington to cling on to a ‘special’ position in the world’s evolving economy will not work. Last year just under 30% of China’s exports went to the Group of Seven (G7) rich countries, down from 48% in 2000.
Since the end of the Second World War most areas of the world have benefited from increased globalisation, trade and co-operation. The keystone of this progress has been free trade agreements and investment to open up new production sectors and new markets. In the interests of both the British people, the Chinese people and the people of the world, let’s hope that the small seeds of better relationships between Britain and China can be sustained and brought to fruition in the future.
( photographs courtesy of our friends at CGTN)