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Scraping opium resin off a seedpod in Myanmar’s remote poppy fields, displaced farmer Aung Hla describes the narcotic crop as his only prospect in a country made barren by conflict.The 35-year-old was a rice farmer when the junta seized power in a 2021 coup, adding pro-democracy guerillas to the long-running civil conflict between the military and ethnic armed groups.Four years on, the United Nations has said Myanmar is mired in a “polycrisis” of mutually compounding conflict, poverty and environmental damage.Aung Hla was forced off his land in Moe Bye village by fighting after the coup. When he resettled, his usual crops were no longer profitable, but the hardy poppy promised “just enough for a livelihood”.”Everyone thinks people grow poppy flowers to be rich, but we are just trying hard to get by,” he told AFP in rural Pekon township of eastern Shan state.He says he regrets growing the substance — the core ingredient in heroin — but said the income is the only thing separating him from starvation.”If anyone were in my shoes, they would likely do the same.”- Displaced and desperate -Myanmar’s opium production was previously second only to Afghanistan, where poppy farming flourished following the US-led invasion in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks.But after the Taliban government launched a crackdown, Myanmar overtook Afghanistan as the world’s biggest producer of opium in 2023, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).Myanmar’s opiate economy — including the value of domestic consumption as well as exports abroad — is estimated between $589 million and $1.57 billion, according to the UNODC.Between September and February each year, dozens of workers toil in Pekon’s fields, slicing immature poppy seedpods, which ooze a small amount of sticky brown resin.Aung Naing, 48, gently transfers the collected resin from a small trough onto a leaf plate.Before the coup, which ended a brief experiment with democracy, Aung Naing was areformed opium farmer. But wartime hardship forced him back to the crop.”There is more poppy cultivation because of difficulties in residents’ livelihoods,” he says.”Most of the farmers who plant poppy are displaced,” he said. “Residents who can’t live in their villages and fled to the jungle are working in poppy fields.”In Myanmar’s fringes, ethnic armed groups, border militias and the military all vie for control of local resources and the lucrative drug trade.Aung Naing says poppy earns only a slightly higher profit than food crops like corn, bean curd and potatoes, which are also vulnerable to disease when it rains.Fresh opium was generally sold by Myanmar farmers for just over $300 per kilo in 2024, according to the UNODC, a small fraction of what it fetches on the international black market.And the crop is more costly to produce than rice — more labour intensive, requiring expensive fertilisers and with small yields.Aung Naing says he makes just shy of a $30 profit for each kilo. “How can we get rich from that?” he asks.- ‘Unsafe’ -The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates there are more than 3.5 million people displaced in Myanmar.But fleeing conflict zones to farm opium does not guarantee safety. “Military fighter jets are flying over us,” said Aung Naing. “We are working in poppy fields with anxiety and fear. We feel unsafe.”Opium cultivation and production in Myanmar decreased slightly between 2023 and 2024, according to the UNODC — in part due to ongoing clashes between armed groups.”If our country were at peace and there were industries offering many job opportunities in the region, we wouldn’t plant any poppy fields even if we were asked to,” says farmer Shwe Khine, 43.Aung Hla agreed. With the war, he said, “we don’t have any choice”.

Indonesian private tutor Patricia has been learning German for two years, armed with a dream of leaving for Europe and driven by a lack of opportunities, economic stagnation and little hope at home.She is one of thousands of Indonesians on social media promoting a popular hashtag that translates as “let’s just escape for now”.Anger at the quality of life in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy — a nation of 280 million known for pervasive corruption and nepotism — has stirred student protests and driven young and middle-aged professionals to seek jobs abroad.”After working for so many years, my income remains about the same… meanwhile my needs are increasing,” said the 39-year-old in the capital Jakarta, who declined to give her last name.”I don’t own a house or car… if I keep working like this, it will probably never be enough.”In the last month, the hashtag has picked up steam. It has racked up thousands of mentions and reached more than 65 million accounts on X, formerly Twitter, analytics firm Brand24 said.The outpouring has coincided with student-led protests against wide-ranging government budget cuts by new President Prabowo Subianto.Savings have been channelled into a new multi-billion-dollar sovereign wealth fund — that reports to the ex-general.- ‘Want to fight’ -There were nearly 7.5 million unemployed people in Indonesia, according to the latest figures from the country’s statistics agency, dating to August 2024.That has stoked anger against a perceived poor quality of life, as the divide between the emerging nation’s rich and poor grows wider and the middle class is squeezed.”After many strange policies and the change of president, I have shifted to feeling like I have to move abroad. It has become a primary necessity,” said Chyntia Utami, a 26-year-old tech worker in Jakarta.”I really feel it. I don’t get social assistance, and I have limited money to spend. Working is just about surviving day by day, month by month, not working with passion.”Some Indonesians are taking more physically demanding jobs abroad to escape.Randy Christian Saputra, 25, left an office job at a multinational consulting firm to do manual labour on a tomato farm in Australia.”I’m tired of the system in Indonesia. If we look abroad, they usually have a better system,” he said.Poor living standards in the megacity Jakarta encourage others to leave.”The longer I stay in Jakarta, the harder it is because of pollution or traffic jams. It has more to do with the living standard,” said Favian Amrullah, a 27-year-old software engineer, who is leaving for a tech startup in Amsterdam in April.”I am exhausted, and feeling hopeless.”Some foreign companies are trying to capitalise on the trend, including Japanese recruitment firms posting online seeking to attract the most talented.Experts said social media offers Indonesians an outlet where they feel heard.”This showed the public’s emotion,” said Ika Karlina Idris, associate professor at Monash University Indonesia.She said the hashtag highlighted “the public’s concerns about jobs and nepotism” as well as at “haphazard public policies”.- ‘Don’t come back’ -The uproar sparked criticism from some government ministers. One even told those who wish to leave should not return.”Just run away, if necessary, don’t come back,” Deputy Manpower Minister Immanuel Ebenezer told a reporter last month. He did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment.Pro-Prabowo influencers have also spread disinformation, aiming to undermine the credibility of protesters.In recent weeks, AFP’s Fact Check team found more than a dozen TikTok videos pushing the baseless claim that student protesters are “paid”, which attracted more than eight million views.Pro-government and pro-Prabowo content creators then posted reaction videos amplifying the misinformation on YouTube and TikTok, garnering more than two million views, AFP Fact Check found.Patricia remains undeterred, applying for a volunteer post in Germany in the hope she can find a paid job once there.”I want to fight there for a better job, life, a better income,” she said. “When I have a place there… no, I won’t be returning to Indonesia.”

The Japanese owner of 7-Eleven said Monday it had agreed to jointly explore store sell-offs with a Canadian rival to address antitrust concerns ahead of a potential merger.It comes just days after Seven & i — which for two decades has wholly owned 7-Eleven, the world’s biggest convenience store brand — announced measures including a huge share buyback to fend off a takeover from Canada’s Alimentation Couche-Tard (ACT).Seven & i last year rebuffed ACT’s initial buyout offer worth nearly $40 billion, saying it had “grossly” undervalued its business and could face regulatory hurdles.It would be the biggest foreign takeover of a Japanese firm — merging the 7-Eleven, Circle K and other franchises to create a global convenience store behemoth.Japanese media reported last week that a special committee scrutinising a raised offer by ACT of reportedly around $47 billion had decided to reject that too.But Seven & i said merging with ACT was still on the table, and on Monday gave details of how they are working together.The pair will “map out the viability of a divestiture process” by discussing “the group of stores to be sold and identifying potential buyers”, a Seven & i statement said.This would give a sense of how likely US antitrust regulators were to be satisfied, it said, adding that “joint outreach” by financial advisors to potential buyers had begun.”We can now make progress towards determining whether a credible and actionable… divestiture package can be achieved that would allow a realistic assessment of ACT’s proposal,” it said.- ‘Hostile’ bid -Seven & i operates some 85,000 convenience stores worldwide.Around a quarter of 7-Eleven outlets are in Japan where they sell everything from concert tickets to pet food and fresh rice balls, although sales have been flagging.On Thursday, Seven & i had said it planned to buy back two trillion yen ($13.2 billion) of its own shares.It also announced an IPO of its US unit and named Stephen Dacus as its first foreign CEO.ACT, which began with one store in Quebec in 1980, runs nearly 17,000 convenience store outlets worldwide, including Circle K.”We believe there is a clear path to obtaining regulatory approvals,” ACT said Friday, adding that it had “identified a potential divestiture portfolio of US stores”.Roy Larke, co-founder of analysis firm JapanConsuming, told AFP that “I think Seven & i still plans to fight what is in practicality a hostile takeover bid from ACT”.”To avoid this, Seven & i may agree to sell all or part of 7-Eleven in order to be allowed to continue its rebuilding in Japan alone,” he said.”The antitrust issues raised by Seven & i are likely to be genuine problems and prove to be a significant barrier,” Larke said.But “I would not be surprised if a deal was done to merge the US operations (subject to government approval)”.

The Japanese government began a rare auction on Monday of its emergency rice stockpiles in a bid to help drive down the surging price of the national staple.Rice shortages driven by factors from poor harvests caused by hot weather to panic-buying over a “megaquake” warning last summer have caused prices to nearly double over a year.Exacerbating the problem, some businesses are also thought to be keeping their inventories and waiting for the most opportune time to sell.Japan stores about a million tons of rice for emergencies.The country has previously tapped into these reserves during disasters, but this is the first time since the stockpile was built in 1995 that supply chain problems are behind the move.The agriculture ministry is expected to select successful bidders for 150,000 tons of rice by Wednesday — with the auctioned grain expected to hit store shelves by the end of March.The ministry says it plans to release another 60,000 tons if necessary.”This is a highly irregular situation,” agriculture minister Taku Eto told parliament on Monday.”By sorting out the clogged parts of the distribution network, we hope to relieve the hardship experienced by consumers.”Experts say several factors have contributed to the crisis.Among them is a tourism boom and shortages caused by record heatwaves in recent years, as Japan, like other countries, experiences the effects of human-driven climate change.In August last year, shelves in some stores emptied after the government warned of a possible “megaquake”, along with one of the fiercest typhoons in decades and the annual Obon holiday.

Shares in Hong Kong and Shanghai sank Monday on a mixed day for Asian markets after data showing Chinese consumer prices slipped back into deflation stoked fresh concerns over the world’s number two economy.The reading compounded uncertainty on trading floors as investors struggle to keep up with Donald Trump’s trade policy tinkering, while his refusal to rule out a US recession this year further rattled confidence.The president’s on-again, off-again tariff threats against Canada, Mexico, China and others have left financial markets in turmoil and consumers unsure what the year might bring. Traders are also keeping tabs on Beijing as Chinese leaders wrap up their annual rubber stamp parliament gathering where they set a 2025 annual growth target of around five percent, vowed to make domestic demand its main economic driver, and unveiled a rare hike in fiscal funding.The need for more measures to boost the faltering economy was highlighted at the weekend by figures showing consumer prices fell 0.7 percent in February, the first drop in 13 months.”The data only reinforces what’s been clear for months — deflationary pressures remain firmly entrenched in the world’s second-largest economy,” said Stephen Innes at SPI Asset Management.”The property sector remains stuck in the mud, domestic demand is weak, and despite a bounce in tech stocks, the broader wealth effect just isn’t filtering through to consumers. “Chinese retail investors might be riding the market rally, but the fact that household spending remains subdued suggests most are either tapped out or too cautious to dive into equities. A stock market pop doesn’t fix a sluggish economy overnight.”Hong Kong stocks, which have surged 20 percent this year to a three-year high, lost more than one percent and Shanghai was off around 0.4 percent. There were also losses in Singapore, Taipei and Jakarta, though Tokyo, Sydney, Seoul, Wellington and Manila rose.The mixed start to the week followed a positive day on Wall Street where investors welcomed soothing comments on the economy from Federal Reserve boss Jerome Powell, which offset a slightly below par jobs data.However, there is a growing worry about the growth outlook owing to Trump’s tariffs, federal job cuts and still-high inflation.His on-again, off-again tariff threats against Canada, Mexico, China and others have left the US financial markets in turmoil and consumers unsure what the year might bring.Analysts described the jobs report as unspectacular, but good enough to suggest the labour market is not weakening precipitously.The reading “shows private-sector demand for labour stayed strong just prior to the spike in economic policy uncertainty which has produced a sharp fall in business and consumer confidence”, said Ray Attrill at National Australia Bank.”As Pantheon Economics notes, it is the government sector, which added just 11,000 to payrolls last month compared to a prior six-month average of 35,000 that accounts for the modestly below-trend overall February result.””The hit to payrolls from layoffs of federal employees instigated by DOGE lies in the near future,” he added, referring to the Department of Government Efficiency run by Trump’s billionaire ally Elon Musk.Trump raised worries about a recession Sunday when asked by Fox News if a downturn was possible this year by replying “I hate to predict things like that”.He added: “There is a period of transition, because what we’re doing is very big — we’re bringing wealth back to America,” he said, adding: “It takes a little time.”- Key figures around 0230 GMT -Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 0.6 percent at 37,095.85 (break)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: DOWN 1.2 percent at 23,940.48Shanghai – Composite: DOWN 0.4 percent at 3,358.29Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0849 from $1.0844 on FridayPound/dollar: DOWN at $1.2924 from $1.2925Dollar/yen: DOWN 147.55 yen from 147.97 yenEuro/pound: DOWN at 83.93 pence from 83.87 penceWest Texas Intermediate: DOWN 0.6 percent at $66.62 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: DOWN 0.6 percent at $69.96 per barrelNew York – Dow: UP 0.5 percent at 42,801.72 (close)London – FTSE 100: FLAT at 8,679.88 (close)

Beijing’s tariffs on certain US agricultural goods in retaliation for President Donald Trump’s latest hike on Chinese imports came into force Monday, as trade tensions mount between the world’s two leading economies. Since retaking office in January, Trump has unleashed a barrage of tariffs on major US trading partners, including China, Canada and Mexico, citing their failure to stop illegal immigration and flows of deadly fentanyl.After imposing a blanket 10 percent tariff on all Chinese goods in early February, Trump hiked the rate to 20 percent last week.Beijing reacted quickly, its finance ministry accusing Washington of “undermining” the multilateral trading system and announcing fresh measures of its own.Those tariffs come into effect Monday and see levies of 10 and 15 percent imposed on several US farm products.Chicken, wheat, corn and cotton from the United States will now be subject to the higher charge.Soybeans, sorghum, pork, beef, aquatic products, fruit, vegetables and dairy will face the slightly lower rate.The tariffs will not apply to goods that left before March 10, however, as long as they arrive in China by April 12.Analysts say Beijing’s retaliatory tariffs are designed to hurt Trump’s voter base while remaining restrained enough to allow room to hash out a trade deal.The increasing trade headwinds add to difficulties faced by Chinese leaders currently seeking to stabilise the country’s wavering economy.Sluggish consumer spending, a prolonged debt crisis in the vast property sector and high youth unemployment are among the issues now facing policymakers.Analysts say China’s exports — which last year reached record highs — might not provide the same economic lifeline for Beijing as its trade war with Washington intensifies.- ‘Complex and severe’ -Experts say the full effects of the recent wave of tariffs have yet to be fully felt, though early signs already indicate a downturn in shipments.China’s exports grew 2.3 percent year-on-year during the first two months of 2025, official data showed Friday, missing expectations and slowing significantly from the 10.7 percent growth recorded in December.”As exports face downside risk with trade war looming, the fiscal policy needs to become more proactive,” wrote Zhiwei Zhang, president and chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management.The latest trade data came as Chinese officials congregated in Beijing for the country’s largest annual political gathering, known as the “Two Sessions”.During a speech to delegates on Wednesday, Premier Li Qiang laid out the government’s economic strategy for the year ahead, acknowledging “an increasingly complex and severe external environment”.Li also announced that the government’s official growth target for the year ahead would be “around five percent” — the same as 2024.Many economists consider that goal to be ambitious, considering the hurdles facing China’s economy.”If fiscal spending starts to ramp up again soon then that could more than offset the near-term hit to growth from tariffs,” wrote Julian Evans-Pritchard of Capital Economics.”However, given the wider headwinds… we still aren’t convinced that fiscal support will be sufficient to deliver anything more than a short-lived boost,” he added.

The Japanese owner of 7-Eleven said Monday it had agreed to jointly explore store sell-offs with Alimentation Couche-Tard (ACT) to address antitrust concerns ahead of a potential merger.It comes just days after Seven & i — which has wholly owned 7-Eleven, the world’s biggest convenience store brand, since 2005 — announced a raft of new measures to fend off a takeover from its Canadian rival.”Joint outreach by financial advisors to ACT and 7&i to potential buyers has begun,” Seven & i said in a statement.Couche-Tard has agreed to jointly “map out the viability of a divestiture process by defining operational, management, and financial characteristics of the group of stores to be sold and identifying potential buyers”, it added.”This would provide some insight into the prospects of success along terms that had a reasonable likelihood of satisfying US antitrust regulators,” Seven & i said.”We and our advisors believe we can now make progress towards determining whether a credible and actionable remedy and divestiture package can be achieved that would allow a realistic assessment of ACT’s proposal.”On Thursday, the Tokyo-based company announced a huge share buyback and an IPO of its US unit — the latest twist in a saga that began last year, when Seven & i rebuffed a takeover offer worth nearly $40 billion from ACT.When Seven & i rejected the initial takeover offer from ACT in September, the company said it had “grossly” undervalued its business and could face regulatory hurdles.Such a takeover would be the biggest foreign buyout of a Japanese firm, merging the 7-Eleven, Circle K and other franchises to create a global convenience store behemoth.Japan’s Yomiuri daily reported last week that a special committee scrutinising ACT’s raised offer of reportedly around $47 billion had decided formally to reject that too.Seven & i, which operates some 85,000 convenience stores worldwide, also named Stephen Dacus as its first foreign CEO on Thursday.Around a quarter of 7-Eleven stores are in Japan where they are a beloved institution, selling everything from concert tickets to pet food and fresh rice balls.ACT, which began with one store in Quebec in 1980, runs nearly 17,000 convenience store outlets worldwide, including Circle K.

Trade tensions between the world’s two leading economies are set to escalate on Monday, as Beijing begins levying tariffs on certain US agricultural goods in retaliation for President Donald Trump’s latest hike on Chinese imports.Since retaking office in January, Trump has unleashed a barrage of tariffs on major US trading partners, including China, Canada and Mexico, citing their failure to stop illegal immigration and flows of deadly fentanyl.After imposing a blanket 10 percent tariff on all Chinese goods in early February, Trump hiked the rate to 20 percent last week.Beijing reacted quickly, its finance ministry accusing Washington of “undermining” the multilateral trading system and announcing fresh measures of its own.The moves will see fresh tariffs of 10 and 15 percent imposed on several US farm products, starting on Monday.Chicken, wheat, corn and cotton from the United States will now be subject to the higher charge while soybeans, sorghum, pork, beef, aquatic products, fruit, vegetables and dairy will face the slightly lower rate.Analysts say Beijing’s retaliatory tariffs are designed to hurt Trump’s voter base while remaining restrained enough to allow room to hash out a trade deal.The increasing trade headwinds add to difficulties faced by Chinese leaders currently seeking to stabilise the country’s wavering economy.Sluggish consumer spending, a prolonged debt crisis in the vast property sector and high youth unemployment are among the issues now facing policymakers.China’s exports — which last year reached record highs — might not provide the same economic lifeline for Beijing as its trade war with Washington intensifies.- ‘Complex and severe’ -Experts say the full effects of the recent wave of tariffs have yet to be fully felt, though early signs already indicate a downturn in shipments.China’s exports grew 2.3 percent year-on-year during the first two months of 2025, official data showed Friday, missing expectations and slowing significantly from the 10.7 percent growth recorded in December.”As exports face downside risk with trade war looming, the fiscal policy needs to become more proactive,” wrote Zhiwei Zhang, president and chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management.The latest trade data came as Chinese officials congregated in Beijing for the country’s largest annual political gathering, known as the “Two Sessions”.During a speech to delegates on Wednesday, Premier Li Qiang laid out the government’s economic strategy for the year ahead, acknowledging “an increasingly complex and severe external environment”.Li also announced that the government’s official growth target for the year ahead would be “around five percent” — the same as 2024.But many economists consider that goal to be ambitious, considering the hurdles facing China’s economy.”If fiscal spending starts to ramp up again soon then that could more than offset the near-term hit to growth from tariffs,” wrote Julian Evans-Pritchard of Capital Economics.”However, given the wider headwinds… we still aren’t convinced that fiscal support will be sufficient to deliver anything more than a short-lived boost,” he added.

The new CEO of LIV told AFP the world of golf will eventually “open up again” and the Saudi-bankrolled league has an important role in growing the game around the world.American sports executive Scott O’Neil, who has in the past run NBA and NHL teams, took the reins from Greg Norman in January.The period since has seen a flurry of meetings between the PGA Tour, LIV Golf and their Saudi backers, the Public Investment Fund (PIF), but still no deal reached to reunite the sport.”I think LIV has a place and an important place, and it’s very different from anybody else in golf,” O’Neil told AFP in an exclusive interview on the sidelines of this week’s LIV Hong Kong tournament.Only days ago leading PGA Tour player Rory McIlroy said that a deal to reunify golf did not feel any closer.O’Neil would not comment on the stop-start talks with the PGA Tour but pointed out that the once icy reception from golf’s majors to the breakaway series had thawed.”I feel like the narrative just generally is shifting in and around LIV and golf,” said O’Neil, who is the former CEO of the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers. “That’s probably most highlighted by each of the four majors in inviting LIV players and providing a pathway for LIV players to play in the majors, which I think is a great, positive step in the right direction.”But as it stands LIV’s multiple major champions and greats of the game such as Jon Rahm, current US Open champion Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson only go up against the cream of the PGA Tour four times a year.- ‘That day will come’ -There remains no free movement of players between the tours, and the only time LIV players can currently face the best of the PGA Tour is at those four majors.O’Neil, however, is optimistic.”Eventually, I believe that golf will open up again,” he told AFP. “We would like player movement. We’d like opportunities for our incredible stars to play around the world.”And I think that day will come. But in the meantime, let’s enjoy the majors.”Asked if there was a place for LIV in a future integrated golf calendar, along the lines of cricket’s money-spinning IPL, O’Neil said he saw LIV as the pinnacle of the sport.”We’re very much the Formula One of golf,” he said. “I don’t think there’s any other parallel that you can find.”LIV Golf, with its unique 54-hole, shotgun-start tournaments which have individual and team competitions with music blasting across the fairways, is in its fourth year and third full season.And O’Neil predicted it had a bright future.The league’s slogan has evolved this year from “Golf But Louder” to “Long LIV Golf” and O’Neil said that “is the essence of who we will become”.”It’s kind of our seal of approval, if you will, of our entry into the golf infrastructure around the world.”For now, the CEO is happy to wait for the day when golf’s conflicts are resolved, and said he was focused on moving forward with LIV.”I don’t spend too much time looking in the rearview mirror. I spend much more time looking through the windshield,” he said.”We take great pleasure, and we feel it’s a humbling honour, to be able to take these star players to the four corners of the earth.”Whether it be Riyadh, Adelaide, Hong Kong — we’re now off to Singapore, and pit-stopping in Miami, before Mexico City, and then Seoul, Korea.”Everywhere we go I kind of sit back and just smile. I think this is the way golf should be.”I think golf is growing all over the world, and I think we’ll play a role in that growth.”

Consumer prices in China fell last month for the first time in a year, with authorities in the world’s second-largest economy struggling to kickstart spending and trade headwinds intensifying as US tariffs kick in under Donald Trump.Consumer spending in China has been mired in a slump since the end of the pandemic, fuelling fears of a deflationary spiral.Adding to the pressure is a second term as President Trump, who has since taking office in January slapped sweeping tariffs on Chinese products.Beijing’s latest retaliatory measures — tariffs targeting US agricultural goods including corn and chickens — are set to take effect on Monday.An intensified trade war will likely mean that China cannot peg its hopes for strong economic growth this year on its exports, which last year reached record highs.The consumer price index (CPI) — a key measure of inflation — was down 0.7 percent year-on-year in February, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).The reading represented a steeper decline than the slump of 0.4 percent in the index forecast by a Bloomberg survey.It also reversed the 0.5 percent uptick recorded in January, when a surge in spending during the Lunar New Year boosted inflation to its highest rate in months.”This is mainly due to the impact of factors such as the (Lunar New Year) being in a different month, holidays and price fluctuations of some international staple commodities,” said Dong Lijuan of the NBS in a statement.The latest figures come as Chinese officials convene in Beijing for the country’s biggest annual political gathering known as the “Two Sessions”.- Get consumers spending -Beijing announced on Wednesday the government’s official target of two percent inflation this year, during which time leaders hope to get consumers spending again.”China’s economy still faces deflationary pressure,” wrote Zhiwei Zhang, President and Chief Economist at Pinpoint Asset Management.”As exports face downside risk with trade war looming, the fiscal policy needs to become more proactive,” he said, adding that “domestic demand remains weak”.China last year saw exports surge to a record high — a key economic lifeline as persistent woes including slow consumption and a property sector crisis weighed on activity.Experts say the full impact of a renewed trade war with the United States on China’s economy remains to be seen, but early signs are already emerging.The country’s exports grew 2.3 percent year-on-year during the first two months of 2025, official data showed Friday, missing expectations and slowing down significantly from the 10.7 growth recorded in December.At a Wednesday gathering as part of the “Two Sessions”, Premier Li Qiang announced a national growth target of “around five percent” for this year — the same as 2024.Many economists consider the goal to be ambitious, given the accelerating headwinds facing China’s economy.