🌍 Peter’s Perspective Bi-weekly News Digest

Grounded in the same four pillars as my book West meets East, this page brings you the stories shaping mainland China, Singapore and Taiwan. If you don’t speak Mandarin, but want a clear insider-informed view that complements Western perspectives – you’re in the right place. Every two weeks I scan trusted East Asian sources like SCMP, Caixin, Straits Times, Xinhua and Taipei Times to bring you the top 20 stories you need to know. Just like in my book, each edition is organized around four key themes: 

PEOPLE & CULTURE: From martial arts revivals and sports to Asia’s most creative cultural exports.
LEADERSHIP & ECONOMY Trade shifts, five-year plans and tech-powered policy transformations.
TECH & INNOVATION: Semiconductors, AI, and university spin-offs that are redefining global innovation.
CLIMATE , ENERGY & FOOD: From battery breakthroughs to sustainable change.

Stay curious – Bookmark, check every other Friday for fresh insights and share this page! 

🌏 July 11 – July 24, 2025

  • Are drone shows, global-street foods carnivals and snack-filled book fairs reshaping Asia’s cultural playbook for Gen Z tourists?
  • Can a Beijing-Brussels summit ease tarrifs and fuel greener business across Europe?
  • From satellites to typhoon-proof wind turbines, is East Asia testing vital climate solutions? 

People & Culture

  • Yi Torch Festival re-ignites Guizhou’s night sky – 10,000 flaming torches, drone formations and live Yi folk rock drew crowds to Liupanshui, with officials eyeing 150 k+ visitors and big livestream numbers. It shows how minority rites are being rebooted as Insta-friendly tourism boosters. 🔥 | 18 Jul 2025 Xinhua News
  • Taiwan’s Sunset Rollercoaster levels up at Fuji Rock – The indie darlings will play the Japanese mega-fest’s 40k-capacity Green Stage, alongside a Taiwan–Japan rookie stage tie-up. It underlines how Mandarin-language acts are cracking the region’s biggest rock podiums. 🎸 | 18 Jul 2025 Taipei Times
  • Macau cooks up a ‘Cities of Gastronomy’ carnival – Street chefs from six continents, art markets and tasting passes turn Senado Square into a global food court as the city pivots from baccarat to bibimbap. Culinary tourism is the new jackpot. 🍲 | 14 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post
  • Hong Kong Book Fair goes snack-tastic – The week-long fair adds a “World of Snacks” hall and sports expo to lure Gen Z readers with bubble-tea demos and esports show matches, targeting >1 million visitors. Books meet bites for maximal FOMO. 📚| 11 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post
  • Liverpool mania warms up Hong Kong Football Festival – 27,000 fans watched the Reds train at Kai Tak Stadium ahead of the July 26-28 mini-tournament, boosting hotel bookings and merch drops. European footie fandom still packs economic punch in the Pearl River Delta. ⚽  | 24 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post

Leadership & Economy

  • China-EU summit: Xi woos Brussels with ‘win-win’ talk – Meeting EU chiefs in Beijing on July 24, President Xi promised easier market access and green-tech cooperation, as both sides try to calm a €300 bn trade gap. The get-together will steer 2025’s biggest China-Europe reset. 🤝 | 24 Jul 2025 Xinhua News
  • 16 m drop out of China’s medical insurance pool – Caixin finds local deficits and ageing pressures pushing millions to quit a key basic-care plan, signalling fiscal strains that could reshape China’s social contract. 🩺  | 16 Jul 2025 Caixin Global
  • Chinese firms in Europe urge ‘substantive’ summit deal – A Paris-based lobby of 400 companies wants tariff cuts and regulatory clarity ahead of the Beijing leaders’ summit, showing business anxieties run both ways across the bloc. 🇪🇺  | 22 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post
  • Taiwanese wallets less gloomy – Cathay Financial’s July survey shows consumer-confidence edging up as stock bulls outnumber bears for the first time in months, hinting at mid-year spending momentum. 💳 | 22 Jul 2025 Taipei Times
  • Singapore core inflation unmoved at 0.6 % – June data surprised analysts with flat prices, giving the MAS breathing room and young consumers a brief cost-of-living break. 🥤  | 23 Jul 2025 The Straits Times

Technology & Innovation

  • TSMC books four new 1.4-nm ‘mega-fabs’ – The chip titan will start construction in Taichung this year, aiming for 2028 production and >20,000 new jobs. Taiwan is doubling down on bleeding-edge silicon to keep rivals a node behind. 🖥️ | 20 Jul 2025 Taipei Times
  • ASML still bullish on China sales – The Dutch lithography giant told Caixin that mainland orders will stay >25 % of revenue despite export-control noise, spotlighting Europe’s tight entanglement with China’s chip build-out. 🛠️ | 17 Jul 2025 Caixin Global
  • AI ‘teachers’ school China’s edtech firms – A Caixin deep-dive shows start-ups racing to launch GPT-powered tutoring bots, but parents still want real grades before paying. The jury’s out on robo-report cards. 🤖  | 18 Jul 2025 Caixin Global
  • Nvidia boss hails China’s open-source AI – Jensen Huang called DeepSeek, Qwen and Kimi “world-class” models as H20 chip sales to China resume, framing open code as Beijing’s competitive edge. ⚙️ | 17 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post
  • Shijian satellites may have docked in space first – Tracking data suggests Shijian-21 refuelled Shijian-25 in geostationary orbit, a feat the US aims to replicate only by 2026. China’s on-orbit servicing ambitions just got real. 🛰️  | 14 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post

Climate Action, Energy & Food

  • HK students light rural Rwanda with solar – A PolyU team installed off-grid panels for 120 homes, blending climate service learning with South-South tech transfer. Sunshine diplomacy in action. ☀️ | 18 Jul 2025 Xinhua News
  • Typhoon Wipha batters Taiwan, turbines hold – 200 mm rains cut ferries but offshore wind farms stayed online, proving new storm-hardening standards pay off. Weather resilience is quietly powering Asia’s green grid. 🌪️ | 20 Jul 2025 Taipei Times
  • China starts building a mega-dam in Xizang – Caixin reports a 70-GW hydropower project paired with cross-grid trading pilots to balance wind-solar surges, hydro’s comeback in the clean-power mix. 💧 | 22 Jul 2025 Caixin Global, see also Reuters
  • Lab turns CO₂ into table sugar – Chinese chemists demo a catalyst that converts methanol to white sugar, hinting at future carbon-negative sweeteners and bio-plastics. Sweet science could clean the air. 🍬 | 22 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post
  • Heat dome grips China, 40 °C plus looms – Meteorologists warn of record-breaking temperatures across 17 provinces, raising power-grid and crop-yield fears as climate volatility escalates. 🔥 | 22 Jul 2025 The Straits Times

🌏 June 27 – July 10, 2025

  • Why are festivals across Hong Kong, Singapore and Macao mixing pop music, streetwear and foodie culture to lure new crowds?
  • Can a tiny rise in China’s prices and a bold €4.5 trillion growth plan really steady Asia’s economy—and open fresh doors for Europe?
  • Could home-grown AI chips and space-grown rice push East Asia ahead in the race for both cutting-edge tech and food security?

People & Culture

  • Hot-air balloons meet Cantopop (Hong Kong) – The AIA International Hot Air Balloon Fest will float panda-, dinosaur- and rabbit-shaped balloons above Victoria Harbour this September while stars Joey Yung and Leo Ku play nightly gigs, with organisers eyeing 80 000 visitors and a tourism bump. This mash-up of Insta-ready visuals and classic Cantopop shows how Hong Kong is repackaging tradition for Gen Z wanderlust. 🎈
    | 7 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post

  • Singapore’s July gig-fest – From the Skechers Sundown street-culture bash to Esplanade’s month-long Jazz in July sessions (plus Indonesian rockers D’Masiv), Singapore is packing club, park and mall stages with affordable shows that blur music, sneaker and F&B scenes. A reminder that the Lion City sells lifestyle diversity, not just high-tech skylines. 🎵
     | 10 Jul 2025 The Straits Times

  • Macao’s Lotus Flower Festival blooms again – The 25th edition opened with art markets, folk parades and – yes – lotus-flavoured desserts, underscoring the city’s push to pivot from casinos to slow-travel culture. For foodie tourists, petals are the new poker chips. 🌸
    | 6 Jul 2025 Xinhua News

  • Taiwanese film composer makes history in Italy – Chiang Yi-chen became the first Asian (and first woman) to win Emerging Composer at the Apulia Soundtrack Awards, boosting Taiwan’s creative soft power in Europe. Proof that Mandarin beats can top Western red carpets. 🏆
    | 9 Jul 2025 Taipei Times

  • Voice-chat app rocked by gambling scandal (China) – Caixin reveals how “Banban” hosts embedded covert betting games, prompting regulators to tighten live-stream rules and sparking debate on digital vice versus free expression. It’s Twitch-culture with Chinese characteristics – and consequences. 🎰
    l | 4 Jul 2025 Caixin Global

Leadership & Economy

  • Tiny uptick, big relief – China’s CPI rises 0.1 % – June’s first inflation gain in five months eased deflation fears even as factory prices slid 3.6 %. Analysts say more stimulus is still likely, but the data hint consumers are spending – at last. 💸
    | 9 Jul 2025 Caixin Global

  • Economic add-on: ¥35 trn in five years – A top official told Xinhua that China’s 2021-25 GDP increment will exceed 35 trillion yuan (≈€4.5 trn), powered by digital and green sectors. Beijing is still betting on scale to outpace headwinds. 📈
    | 9 Jul 2025 Xinhua News

  • Taiwan’s inflation cools to 1.37 % – Slower food and energy price rises gave Taipei extra room to support growth without stoking costs, economists say. Stability matters as export orders wobble. 🧊
    | 9 Jul 2025 Taipei Times

  • Berlin stopover: Wang Yi warns EU on ‘Russia loss’ – China’s foreign minister told Brussels that a weakened Moscow would hurt Europe’s security, framing Beijing as pragmatic mediator while courting German business. A sharp play on geopolitics and trade. 🧐
    | 4 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post

  • Singapore core inflation dips to 0.6 % – Lower services and food prices surprised analysts and may keep the MAS from tightening policy in October, easing wallets for Gen-Z consumers. 🍜
    | 4 Jul 2025 The Straits Times

Technology & Innovation

  • AI-chip start-up Sunrise nets ¥1 bn – Spun out of SenseTime, Sunrise began mass production of its S2 GPUs and raised almost US$140 m, fuelling China’s quest for home-grown AI silicon. 🚀
    | 1 Jul 2025 Caixin Global

  • Eyes like a cyborg – Chinese researchers built a quantum-dot vision sensor that adapts to darkness-to-sunlight changes in 40 s – way faster than humans – opening doors for autonomous drones and AR glasses. 🤖
    | 6 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post

  • Shenzhou-19 crew debriefs Beijing – Fresh from orbit, the three taikonauts detailed experiments on smart materials and space-grown rice, underscoring China’s steady march toward its 2030 moon goals. 🌕
    | 9 Jul 2025 Xinhua News

  • TSMC says U-S fabs won’t slow global push – The chip giant told investors its Arizona build-out won’t cannibalise capacity elsewhere, signaling confidence in meeting record AI demand while hedging geopolitical risk. 🖥️
    | 7 Jul 2025 Taipei Times

  • Baidu overhauls search with Gen-AI – The Chinese web titan rolled out a 1 000-word natural-language engine to claw back market share and monetise AI ads, showing Big Tech’s race to re-invent the browser. 🔍
    | 3 Jul 2025 The Straits Times

Climate Action, Energy & Food

  • Polysilicon giants plan rescue merger – Facing a brutal price war, China’s top solar-grade silicon makers aim to acquire weaker rivals and stabilise a market that underpins the world’s solar panels. Strategy over subsidies. ☀️
    | 9 Jul 2025 Caixin Global

  • Offshore wind powers up fast – China added 4.4 GW of sea-based turbines in H1 2025 and is on track for 9 GW this year, with 22 GW more under construction – proof the deep-sea boom is real. 🌬️
    | 8 Jul 2025 South China Morning Post

  • Hydro boost in Yunnan mountains – A third generating unit at the Huangdeng hydropower station went online, part of China’s plan to balance variable wind and solar with big-dam baseload. 💧
    | 5 Jul 2025 Xinhua News

  • Typhoon Danas tests – and vindicates – Taiwan’s offshore wind fleet – More than 400 turbines survived 160 km/h gusts, even as 450 000 homes briefly lost grid power, bolstering confidence in storm-ready engineering. 🌪️
    | 8 Jul 2025 Taipei Times

  • China building 510 GW of new renewables – A Global Energy Monitor report quoted by The Straits Times shows China constructing 74 % of all solar-wind projects underway worldwide – a scale that will shape global carbon math. ⚡
    | 8 Jul 2025 The Straits Times

🌏 June 13 – 26, 2025

  • What is Zhang Zhi Yi’s new movie, toy monsters suddenly Asia’s hottest tickets—and could they set the next global culture wave?
  • Can China’s new game plan—bigger paychecks and easier IPOs—break through Europe’s red tape and power a €13 billion battery dream?
  • Will robot-dog patrols, driverless testing and a planet-wide solar-wind grid make East Asia the lab for tomorrow’s green tech?

People & Culture

Leadership & Economy

Technology & Innovation

Climate Action, Energy & Food

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