00:00We heard from four key ministers and that included the Housing and Urban Rural Development Minister,
00:04the Minister of Civil Affairs, the Minister of Human Resources and Social Security as well as
00:09the Minister of the National Health Committee. The conference lasted for about two hours and
00:14some of the highlights that we heard included hearing the news that China has achieved an
00:19average life expectancy of 79 years of age. Now that's up 0.4 since 2023 and this rise comes
00:28ahead of a scheduled target that was set in the 14th five-year plan and the Minister of the
00:32National Health Commission said this indicates that the healthy lifestyle of Chinese people
00:37and strategies like the Healthy China initiative are bearing fruit, they're having a positive
00:42impact and improving public health. He said that China now ranks fourth in life expectancy
00:48among 53 middle and high income countries and 10th in the G20. Now in the conference we also
00:54heard plans for policies to provide more stable employment opportunities for young people and
01:00that includes college graduates. It's been a theme we've heard a lot in the two sessions.
01:05China will build an employment friendly development model and improve the efficiency
01:09of matching people with jobs where there are vacancies. The Minister of Human Resources
01:14also called for driving employment through entrepreneurship. Now whether that's through
01:18young people creating entrepreneurship opportunities or through migrant workers
01:22who are returning to hometowns to build businesses. There will be support for older migrant workers
01:28too in training opportunities and increasing income. A big part of the conference focused on
01:34reform for elderly care. This was another highlight. There was a lot said about how to best support
01:39China's aging population going forward in the years ahead and the Minister of Civil Affairs
01:44said that there needs to be institutions for elderly care in the same way that there are
01:47institutions for education, that there's schools, hospitals for medical support and these need to
01:52be developed so that elderly people can have access across the board all over the country
01:57to basic care. The application of information technology in that field was also discussed
02:02so that's things like robotics and the use of artificial intelligence in elderly care.
02:07Yeah and you know this year's two sessions has been placing a strong emphasis on high tech
02:12advancements that are going to enhance people's lives. You've been visiting EV factories, you've
02:18seen some really cutting edge technology, you've seen it firsthand. What can you tell us?
02:27Yes that's right. I mean before we arrived in Beijing to cover the two sessions we traveled
02:31a bit around China. We went to Guangzhou to the GAC car company's factory there. They have built
02:37a brand called ION in 2017 and they have a factory which is called the GAC Intelligent
02:43Networking New Energy Industry Park. So it's not just a factory but indeed facilities for things
02:48like battery research and production, joint ventures with battery and electric drive systems
02:53companies on site and even a battery recycling center and these are all in close proximity.
02:59This is a hallmark of Chinese EV manufacturing to have the supply chain all very close together and
03:04this factory is also extremely environmentally friendly. This is something that we've heard over
03:09and over again at the two sessions that China's emphasizing building manufacturing facilities
03:13that are green. So this assembly line we visited produces zero carbon emissions and it's partly
03:19powered by 85,000 square meters of solar panels on its roof. This is one of China's lighthouse
03:26factories. Now the factories that are called lighthouse are recognized by the World Economic
03:30Forum as having cutting-edge design and the focus is on new energy technologies and green
03:36energy technologies. The assembly line at the GAC ION factory that we saw was fully automated. It
03:41was really impressive running 20 out of 24 hours a day fully flexible so you could have different
03:47models of cars produced at the same time and each car could have thousands of different
03:51customizations on the cars. The line can produce up to 1,200 electric vehicles a day. Now this
03:57model of factory is something that GAC ION wants to promote around the world. Indeed they already
04:01are doing that in Southeast Asia and in Europe they're looking for their first site for a factory
04:07later this year. Now I want to talk about Europe because of course it's very much in the news when
04:11it comes to electric vehicles and China. Coming up on CGTN today and even tomorrow you can watch
04:17our documentary it's called Shocking the System. So we had the opportunity to go and take an in-depth
04:24look into why China is winning the electric vehicle race and whether or not the tariffs that
04:30the EU is imposing on China can do anything to stop their momentum. So we spoke to leaders in
04:35the industry in China, across Europe and we test drove vehicles, we visited factories in China to
04:42see how the manufacturing process works. So you'll get a chance to find out a lot more in an in-depth
04:46way about the processes. You can watch that here on CGTN Europe on the CGTN Europe YouTube channel
04:52and across our social media.
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