The Australian returns to Beijing

After a forced hiatus of almost three years covering China from Taipei, which was instructive, The Australian’s North Asia correspondent, Will Glasgow, is back in Beijing to give readers the closest possible view of the world’s second-largest economy and the region’s most aggressive military power. Despite our frank and fearless reporting and analysis of China and its activities around the world, Glasgow is the first journalist working for Australian media to be based there since August 2020, following China’s four-year black-listing of Australian media. His first report from Beijing, on Saturday, showed the advantages for readers. China’s economic growth is expected to slow to about 5 per cent, low for it but a figure most economies would envy. No story is likely to have as big an impact on the health of the Australian economy and budget than how China fares economically in coming years. What China does next, likewise, has major implications for our defence planners and the Australian Defence Force.

It would be a mistake to expect this opening is part of any new Chinese Communist Party transparency. Chinese officials warned Glasgow about what to expect. “If you are a journalist, the police will be nervous,” they told him. “You will find challenges.” The internet, guarded by China’s Great Firewall, is even more opaque than ever. But the advantages of having a correspondent on the ground outweigh the disadvantages, especially the opportunity to speak frankly with ordinary Chinese people, allowing them, with reasonable safeguards to protect their identity, to tell their stories. Likewise the chance to gauge how the world’s second-largest economy is travelling judging by shopping centres, demand for goods and services, prices, vehicles on the road, infrastructure, property developments, and the real estate sector, which is currently in a deep trough. All of which will impact the demand for Australian exports, especially minerals, agricultural products and services. The reactions of Chinese families, potential students and officials to Australian limits on international students will also become clearer. Glasgow has already found that Chinese people are economising on dental services to the point that dentists are in a price war, but gourmet pet food stores are booming. And plenty of cashed-up customers want Australia’s finest produce.

Other insights are best gauged from around the region, such as the move by Solomon Islands, under Chinese influence, to limit Taiwan’s status as an observer at the this week’s Pacific Islands Forum in Tonga.

Events inside China are changing, too, including planning for the upcoming Team Australia black-tie party on the Great Wall where Australian diplomats and business heads will mingle with representatives from the US, UK, Japan, Canada and New Zealand, and Chinese business leaders. Such developments need first-hand reporting.