First things first: China’s population declines for first time in over 60 years | US news

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china is “Negative Population Era”after the figures showed population decline for the first time since 1961.

The population will end 2022 at 1,411.75 million, down 850,000 from the previous year’s 1126 billion, the National Bureau of Statistics said Tuesday. This marked the beginning of what is expected to be an extended period of population decline, despite government efforts to reverse the trend.

Cai Fang, deputy chairman of the National People’s Congress’ Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee, said on the eve of the data release that China’s population had peaked in 2022, much earlier than expected. “An expert in the field of population and economy predicts that by 2022, or at the latest he said, by 2023, our country will enter a period of negative population growth,” said Tsai.

In recent years, the Chinese government has struggled to encourage people to have more children and stave off a looming demographic crisis caused by an aging population. or has announced cash payments to parents with a third child. Last week, the city of Shenzhen announced financial incentives totaling 37,500 yuan ($5,550) for families with three children.

  • Why do people resist having large families? Online, some Chinese were unsurprised by the announcement, saying there were still social pressures pushing the birth rate down. why not,” said one commenter on Weibo. “Well, who would dare to have children? House prices are so high, no one wants to get married, let alone have children, or even fall in love,” said another.

Democrats’ plan to overhaul the primary process hits new problems

Voters leave their polling place during the New Hampshire Democratic primary in February 2020. Photo: Joseph Prezioso/AFP/Getty Images

The reason the Democrats revamped the presidential primary process is pretty straightforward. The current system is dominated by two states dominated by whites who vote first, giving people of color little say in choosing the next presidential candidate.

But Joe Biden-led efforts to make things fairer in the face of irate New Hampshire officials and Georgia Republicans willing to intervene in Democrats’ plans seem increasingly endangered.

New Hampshire, which held its first presidential primary in decades, has been particularly stubborn, increasing the likelihood of voter fraud occurring within the state.

The Democratic National Committee has approved a new primary election schedule for December 2022.

  • What does the Democratic Party want? Democrats want South Carolina, a more racially diverse state than Iowa or New Hampshire, to be the first to decide who the Democrats should nominate for president. The proposal means New Hampshire, along with Nevada, will vote a week later, while Georgia, another racially diverse state, will win Biden’s 2020 victory and the Democratic Party’s Senate in 2022. It means Georgia, a state critical to its success, will vote next.

California storm“Among the deadliest disasters in our history”

Houses on farmland are seen in the floodwaters from the Salinas River in Salinas, California, USA.
Houses on farmland are seen in the floodwaters from the Salinas River in Salinas, California, USA. Photo: David Swanson/Reuters

As more dangerous storms hit California, The nation has just begun to grapple with destruction and death. Weeks of extreme weather wreaked havoc across nearly every region, from the North Coast to Los Angeles.

A series of storms that have hit California since late December have killed at least 19 people, brought hurricane-strength winds, knocked down trees and power lines, reduced energy to thousands, flooded roads and rivers, and destroyed swaths of land. covered with thick mud and debris. It stretches for miles. While entire communities have been forced to evacuate their homes, road closures and power outages have left some rural areas isolated and largely cut off from the outside world.

Officials are still recording casualties in a disaster hampered by another storm onslaught.

“These storms are among the deadliest natural disasters in our state’s modern history,” Nancy Ward, director of the governor’s Emergency Services Agency, said at a briefing on Friday.

  • What do the experts say? “This is a deadly storm sequence. Damage will be at least hundreds of millions, if not more,” said climate scientist Daniel Swain. The disruption is even for those who have been relatively safe: there are many people who have been without electricity and without road access to where they live for a long time.”

In other news…

New Mexico Republican candidate Solomon Pena has been taken into custody in connection with a recent string of shootings targeting Democrats. Photo: Roberto E Rosales/AP
  • An unsuccessful Republican state legislator who says officials were upset about losing the election He was arrested in November in connection with a series of drive-by shootings, making unsubstantiated allegations that polls were “rigged.” target the homes of Democrats in Albuquerque.

  • More than 7,000 civilians have been killed in Ukraine since Russia invaded the neighboring country last February, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. said yesterday. The United Nations Office for Rights said it had confirmed 7,031 civilian deaths, but believed the actual number of casualties was much higher.

  • Nick Cave analyzed a song “written in Nick Cave’s style” produced by the viral chatbot software ChatGPT, calling it “bullshit”, “A grotesque mockery of being human”. In his newsletter, Red Hand Files, the singer-songwriter analyzes lyrics produced by a popular chatbot.

  • The co-pilot of the Yeti Air flight that crashed in Nepal on Sunday is the widow of a pilot who flew with the same airline and died in a plane crash 16 years ago. No survivors found so far Of the 72 people on board. This is the worst plane crash in his 30 years in the Himalayan country.

Today’s stat: Banks are investing $270 billion despite net-zero pledges Fossil fuel research results

A pump jack works in front of a drilling rig at sunset in an oil field in Midland, Texas. Photo: Nick Oxford/Reuters

Banks and financial institutions that have signed net-zero pledges are still heavily invested in fossil fuels, study shows, leading to accusations that they are acting as ‘climate arsonists’ At COP26, 450 organizations in 45 countries with more than $130 trillion in assets signed GFANZ to invest in line with the goal of limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels. I was proud of myself. But its members have since poured hundreds of billions of dollars into fossil fuels. According to data compiled by pressure group Reclaim FinanceAt least 56 of the largest banks in the Net Zero Banking Alliance Group have provided 102 fossil fuel companies with $270 billion for expansion.

Don’t Miss This: What Does the Word ‘Sun’ Say in Cree? It Starts With Learning Respect

“Our state has about a dozen indigenous languages, and each of those languages ​​has its own set of protocols for who can provide materials.” Illustration: Darby Raymond-Overstreet/the Guardian

According to the United Nations Indigenous languages ​​are lost every two weeksUNESCO has designated this as the Decade of Indigenous Languages. Language is the foundation of culture, so the success of revitalization efforts is critical. Without words, there are no rituals. When the people within a culture can no longer express their identity, the culture as a whole disappears. This most devastating loss is largely a direct result of colonization by European settlers over the last few centuries. All the required English classes, all the tax laws, all the Eurocentric approach to our society, from education to governance, perpetuates colonization. And languages ​​continue to disappear.

Climate check: warning of unprecedented heat waves such as El Niño Predicted to return in 2023

A man looks at the carcasses of dead animals during El Niño drought in southern Hargeisa, Somaliland. Photo: Feisal Omar/Reuters

of Recurrence of El Niño climate phenomenon Scientists warn that global temperatures will rise “abnormally” this year, resulting in unprecedented heatwaves. Early forecasts suggest that El Niño will exacerbate extreme weather events and that global temperature rises are “very likely” to exceed 1.5 degrees. 2016, the hottest year in recorded history, was caused by a strong El Niño. This year he is predicted to be hotter than 2022, with global datasets ranking it as the fifth or sixth hottest on record. But El Niño occurs in the Northern Hemisphere winter and takes months to feel its heating effect, making it likely that a new global temperature record will be set in 2024.

last Thing: Berlin fashion faux pas that Adidas denies involvement cause chaos

Clothing from the Realitywear collection shown at the Impersonator launch event. “This announcement is not made by Adidas and is incorrect,” said a spokesperson for the sportswear company. Photo: Odd Andersen/AFP/Getty Images

Adidas had to deny appointing a former Cambodian union leader as its new co-CEO after a spoofed launch event at Berlin Fashion Week caused turmoil in the fashion world. A press release has been published written by Yesmen of and sent from a fake Adidas email address Sportswear brand’s ‘revolutionary plan’, designed to “own the reality” of the working conditions in the factories in Southeast Asia where much of its clothing is made. This ended up being highlighted by a new “realityware” product range, presumably curated by rapper and producer Pharrell Williams. It consists of clothes “upcycled from clothes worn continuously for six months by Cambodian workers whose wages were deducted during the pandemic.” .

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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jan/17/first-thing-china-population-falls-for-first-time-in-more-than-60-years First things first: China’s population declines for first time in over 60 years | US news

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