@LongDragon
Assuming this is more focused on business relationships than personal, although the two are remarkably similar, the quote is an interesting, but rather limited socio-economic stereotype on an extraordinarily diverse and complicated society.
In my personal opinion based on limited personal experience and hence limited sampling sizes across limited locales, lying is used by the uneducated and uncultured and is akin to upselling - an attempt to enhance something inferior, for personal benefit or gain, often at the expense of the unsuspecting, gullible, or trusting victim.
On the other side of the spectrum - the wealthier, more powerful, affluent, etc. lying is used to deceive, in an attempt to hide or downplay one's true strength, power, or resources. Sometimes is just false or faux humility, as demanded by Confucian, Dao, and Buddhist precepts. It is a form of self defense and self-preservation. Lying is also a form of bluff.
In a populous nation of upsellers trying to access resources - lying, deception, or upselling becomes the norm when interacting with potential resources, hence the logic for guanxi based professional relationships. Guanxi, in my personal experience, is either abused for high risk win-lose propositions, or is effectively used for potential win-win relationships, based on trust.
It's just an opinion, based on very limited personal experiences and observations and I'm not making a judgmental (hopefully not) statement - it's the apparent pervasive and persistent status quo and is something that needs to be managed, if one wishes to do business in China - or any developing nation with similarly evolving and developing characteristics.
In the west, I've personally witnessed major western multinational corporations exhibit design fraud, accounting fraud, contract fraud, using their brands to peddle their ilk.
So fraud and lying is merely a perception and a reality that must be identified (quickly), managed, and controlled to minimize the risk of victimization (for all stakeholders).
It's not the lie which we must manage, it's the intent, as the intent is the root cause. And intent is difficult to root out.
Patrick Scally hands GK editorial reins to Vera van de Nieuwenhof
发布者I was wondering what's next for Patrick. Wish him well in his future endeavors.
Report: Poverty levels continue to drop significantly across Yunnan
发布者@Geogramatt
Assuming your question was serious - a simple google or bing search will yield a plethora of results. The UN (un.edu) has an excellent article on China and India's definition of "poverty lines", but the information is probably outdated as China's economy zooms ahead. China's National Development & Reform Commission - which manages the national five year plan strategies contains the general high level requirements for sustainable development of this country (en.ndrc.gov.cn).
China's five years plans used to be mocked and ridiculed by the western media - but if you've ever performed or witnessed requirements engineering and the processes and artifacts - you cannot but conclude these artifacts are world class professional documents. The Five Year Plans are essentially high level requirements, which indicate the government's architecture for this country - which are then supposed to be devolved by project owners (government officials) into detailed planning documents for execution, monitoring & controlling, and phase out - following generally accepted globally recognized professional standards for professional project management.
Report: Poverty levels continue to drop significantly across Yunnan
发布者Many of China's sustainable poverty elimination plans included seeding of livestock (chickens, pigs, etc) to enable animal husbandry, to increase annual income of the farmers. Last reports were China had sustainable eliminated poverty for over 800 million citizens, with roughly 70-80 million to go. Xi JinPing's goal is 100% elimination by 2020.
Regardless of definition - the consistent attention to poverty elimination is laudable and China's accomplishment in this area is unparalleled in recorded history - resulting in formal recognition by the UN for its successful efforts in this area.
Occasionally, there are questionable ploys to eliminate poverty - such as merely moving people from poverty stricken areas to a different place, to accomplish the numbers - however moving to more fertile or arable ground with better access to transportation, water, healthcare and education facilities can also be considered an improvement in quality of life.
China's current Five Year Plans call for the industrialization of the rural areas, in a responsible sustainable manner. This next move will involve a major cultural shift in the rural areas as farmers begin to aggregate land and resources, pay more attention to water and soil pollution, and reduce the uses of chemical fertilizers and insecticides.
Animal husbandry is another area of potential aggregation - with tremendous opportunities for the high technologies from developed nations such as the EU (+UK), Japan, and USA.
All of these technologies offer the opportunity of significantly reduced water usage and significantly reduced water pollution. It's actually a rather exciting period of history to watch as this massive country continues its transition into a developed nation and global leader and expands into the belt and road with infrastructure development for its neighbors.
If the China model can be applied along the belt and road - the entire Middle East and Africa will finally have the opportunity to similarly eliminate poverty, develop sustainable economies, and perhaps even make serious dents on global terrorism.
Property conglomerate Hang Lung opens Spring City 66, Kunming's tallest building
发布者Terrifying. Two years to get architectural drawings approved and 8 years from inception to project completion. Absolutely terrifying process. I wonder why HangLung was so consistently motivated to develop this project in Kunming?
Video: Zen and the art of patisserie with chef Igor Nataf
发布者Meanwhile - back to Igor's, the video was quite nice also...Thank you.