What is happening in China today?

China has 1.4 billion inhabitants – it is one of the most important economic and political players on the planet. Despite this, we hardly hear anything about developments in the country in the media. Jürgen Kurz, a founding member of the Green Party, has lived and worked in China for over 20 years. He sees his party's „values-based foreign policy„ as prejudiced and destructive. He offers political educational trips to China so that friends and members of the Green Party can form their own impressions. IPPNW member Sigrun Schulze-Stadler traveled with him.

Day 1: Arrival in Beijing

After a ten-hour flight and a problem-free entry, we are greeted by a gigantic airport hall. The first thing I notice is the blue sky, the abundance of greenery and the cleanliness of this city of 27 million - there is no smog to be seen. Our Chinese tour guide Hao Lei explains to us that industry has been banned from the cities. Every year, a tree is planted for every Chinese person and electric cars are heavily promoted, for example through a huge range of charging stations. New registrations account for a third of all cars, about ten times as many as in Germany.

Day 2: Beijing

Our trip begins with the obligatory visit to Tian´anmen Square and the Imperial City, then we visit the Chinese Friendship Society for Other Countries. These influential societies are responsible for trade and foreign relations. Jürgen's contacts open doors for us all over the country. The visit to GIZ is also interesting. The GIZ Regional Director for China and Mongolia, Thorsten Giehler, sees a major problem in the German government's China strategy, which is making cooperation increasingly difficult. We are amazed that GIZ has been acting as an advisor to China for 25 years and even provides legal advice on Chinese legislation.

Day 3: Beijing – Zhengzhou – Xuchang

We take the high-speed train CRH from Beijing to Zhengzhou – a sensational experience for us. After a good two hours and 800 km, we arrive in Zhengzhou right on time.

First we visit the provincial museum: Henan is the scene of the creation of China.

Afterwards we will visit the starting station of the „new Silk Road„. For example, in twelve days, ten shuttle trains transport all kinds of goods to Europe – including Hamburg – and back.

Day 4: Xuchang – Nanjie Cun – Dengfeng

We begin the day in the village of Nanjie Cun, a place of pilgrimage for Chinese tourists. The village continues to cultivate the utopia of a communist society. Those who live there work within the village community, in the common fields and in the factories – in return they are completely provided for: free accommodation, food, health insurance, medical care, school, etc. There are wall newspapers with Marx, Engels, Mao, Lenin and Stalin.

In the afternoon in Dengfeng we see the Shaolin monastery, which was rebuilt after the Cultural Revolution. We are given a warm welcome by the abbot, which is a great honour for us. In the evening we attend a fantastic Shaolin open-air show against the breathtaking backdrop of the Song Mountains.

Day 5: Dengfeng – Luyang – Bengbu

Today we're going to the Longmen Grottoes on the Yihe River in Luoyang, which were built in the fifth century and are a world cultural heritage site with over 100,000 Buddha statues - the largest is 17 meters high, the smallest two centimeters. We then travel by high-speed train for around 1,000 km to Bengbu in three hours.

Day 6: Bengbu – Xiaogang Cun – Nanjing

The attention for our trip is growing: after several newspaper reports, we are even featured on the evening news. The party secretary of Bengbu unexpectedly has breakfast with us and shows us, using the Huaihe River as an example, how ecological modernization is being driven forward in China. A renaturation project on the garbage-filled banks of the Huaihe created an ecological recreational area within 18 months.

Next we go to BBCA, an innovative company that wants to make a global contribution to decarbonization. They produce plastics and fibers for clothing from organic material (corn and potato straw). However, these products are still blocked by regulations in the EU. The major opponent is the mineral oil-processing plastics industry. We are impressed by the variety of products manufactured, all of which are naturally degradable.

China's agrarian reforms can be traced back to the village of Xiaogang Cun. After the collectivization of agriculture caused a famine, the village's farmers made a secret agreement in 1978 to divide the collectively managed farmland back into family plots. This resulted in a drastic increase in grain harvests. The village subsequently became a model for China's privatization policy.

Day 7: Nanjing – Liuzhou

We visit the Nanjing Massacre Museum, which commemorates the conquest of Nanjing by the Japanese in 1937 and the war crimes committed there by the Japanese army, for which Japan has not officially apologized to this day.

The next stop is the house of John Rabe, a German manager of Siemens China. We learn that during the Nanjing Massacre of 1937-38, he set up a protection zone for the Chinese civilian population on the German industrial site, which Japanese soldiers could not enter. In this way, he saved the lives of over 100,000 people.

Day 8: Liuzhou – Sanjiang

We visit the electric car manufacturer Wuling. The first electric car was built here in 2017. It was simply equipped, but it sold well and promoted electric mobility in China. Wuling was at one point the manufacturer that sold the most electric cars in China.

In the afternoon we arrive in the beautiful region of Sanjiang Dong, a minority region where the prevailing poverty is being combated with tea cultivation and tourism. The Chinese constitution obliges the government to create jobs for the minority population.

Day 9: Sanjiang – Longsheng – Guilin

The topic is poverty alleviation in Guangxi, one of the poorest provinces in China. Longsheng is home to farmers from the Dong minority who used to make a living from growing rice and vegetables. They were retrained to grow tea, a successful project as it grows particularly well here. The village also lives from tourism and is now a model for other villages that are switching to growing tea. The tour continues to the village of Ping'an, which belongs to the Zhuang minority and cultivates rice terraces: a tough way of growing rice in a breathtaking landscape. Tourism has been developed here since 1990, which has improved the economic situation of the people.

Day 10: Guilin

This day takes us through the city of Guilin, which is a top tourist destination due to its scenic beauty. The main attraction is the bizarre karst landscape, which is also impressively presented in the local minority museum.

Day 11: Shenzhen

We drive through Huawei's mega campus, which fascinates us with its ecological design. We see their digital commitment to building digital cities of the future, as well as countless industries and plants for alternative energy, and marvel at technologies that are not yet on the market in Europe, such as a super-fast charging technology for electric cars with a charging voltage of more than 900 volts, which can charge batteries for ranges of over 1,000 kilometers in five minutes.

We are also shown a remote-controlled excavator that loads autonomous trucks. Carsten Senz, sinologist and deputy marketing director for Germany, explains the company philosophy that has helped Huawei to succeed. According to Senz, two thirds of the private company's profits are offered to employees every year to buy ownership shares – one third is reinvested. This is a strong incentive for the 12,500 employees to work. Long-standing employees can buy an apartment at the Huawei Ox Horn Campus at a reasonable price. 20 European cities have also been recreated there, and their buildings now serve as research offices. We walk through the imitations of Verona, Paris, Bologna, Granada and Heidelberg. We also see the 150 m long production lines of the current "Mate 60", where 2,700 smartphones roll off the assembly line every day. In the evenings, we have discussions in which we realize how far Chinese companies have overtaken Europe in some sectors and how helplessly the EU has reacted to this.

Day 12: Shenzhen – Shanghai

Our trip ends in Shanghai: with a sightseeing tour along the waterfront promenade The Bund, through the historic old town and the Yu Garden park. In the evening we celebrate our farewell. We are thrilled with our experiences. We had not imagined China to be so modern, hospitable, green and clean. We also got an idea of ​​the political processes there and in many discussions with people we got answers to our questions about poverty, minorities, civil rights, Taiwan and militarization - often surprising, not always completely satisfactory. Overall, the trip was educational and exciting.