Trade, tech and geopolitical rivalry: what you need to understand about China today

Robin Pomeroy: Welcome to Radio Davos and...

Ravi Velloor: I'm Ravi Velloor with Straits Times and this is the Straits Time's Asian Insider Podcast.

Robin Pomeroy: It's great to be co-presenting with you, Ravi. We've talked about this literally for years. And so finally we get to do it. Radio Davos for your listeners is the weekly podcast from the World Economic Forum which looks at lots of big issues in the world with the emphasis on potential solutions, ways of dealing with those problems.

What's your podcast about?

Ravi Velloor: Well, it's about Asia, generally, and it's a weekly podcast, and it rotates between the four of us. And I do it on the second Friday of every month.

Robin Pomeroy: Great well and audiences will get the best of both worlds.

We have a fantastic guest with us to talk about China and China in the world.

She's the Founder and chief Executive Officer of Wusawa Advisory. It's Qian Liu.

Qian Liu: Correct.

Robin Pomeroy: Very good. Did I get the name of your advisory right? Tell us what what that is

Qian Liu: Yes. Well, thank you for asking. And first of all, thank you for having me at both of your podcasts.

So Wusawa is a name that I created. It takes after the Swahili name of Wusawas, so it takes the W outside the equation. So it's U-S-A-W-A, which means balance and equity. So I got the inspiration from Maasai Mara when I was there.

And I realised, look at nature, you know, nature has this magical way of balancing different species. And how is it in the current geopolitical world that we have is so disrupted and uneven? So I felt that the company that we have, the mission is really to provide that understanding and bridges to help the business to navigate through this very uncertain and uneven geopolitical world, especially in the age of China rising.

And Swahili is great because that's where humans originated from. So that's how we got the name. The purpose is to help business to navigate through this uncertain and uneven geopolitical world.

Robin Pomeroy: You're the perfect guest for this episode, right,

Ravi Velloor: Absolutely perfect, and what a name that you've given your company. Thank you. If you don't mind me telling you a little bit of a story about the African dung beetle. Would you like to know that the African Dung Beetle navigates at night using the Milky Way as its guide point?

Qian Liu: That's beautiful.

Ravi Velloor: That shows how related man and not just man but beast and even the smallest insect is with the universe.

Robin Pomeroy: Wow, we've started very poetic. But it's great to be talking about the environment because I've not been hearing enough about that, our relationship with nature.

Qian Liu: It's that ecosystem really.

Robin Pomeroy: Great. Well, hopefully we'll get on to that a little bit. But first, you mentioned the period of China rising. We're speaking, by the way, here at the World Economic Forum's Summer Davos in China, in Dalian.

And yeah, it's China rising, but there are challenges to the Chinese economy, aren't they? If I came to you and said, can you explain to me, we know China's had an economic miracle, but where are things right now? What are the challenges? What would you tell me?

Qian Liu: Yeah, so I like to start by saying that there are both challenges and great opportunities at the Chinese economy, but when we look at the challenges, let me frame it when we look at sort of the typical way of looking at any economy, which is the three key pillars, the export and the import sector, the private consumption part, and then there is the investment part.

So when it comes to export, actually, it's very important to know that, as much as the world is talking about China, you know, over capacity sort of the rising trade surplus, like last year, China's trade surplus grew by 20% compared to the year before, right? So this is causing a lot of discussions in the world.

But the truth that export does not matter to China as much as before. At the peak of time, about 20 years ago, 2007, export was 35% of China's GDP. And right now is about only half of that. Last year was 19, 18% of it.

And as much as we talk about tariffs with the US, for instance, the trade to US is only a tiny part of that. In fact last year, China's exports to the US was less than 10%. And so that is less than 50% of the peak. So when you do the math, even if the entire China's export to the U.S. Were to collapse. That is only about 2% of China's GDP.

So export as important and much discussed is not the most important part of the Chinese economy, but there are of course challenges. For instance, you know, the tariffs war with the U S, but I'm a lot more worried about the upcoming trade war potentially with Europe. So that's one side.

And then the largest part of the Chinese economy is private consumption. And that's worrying because that's almost 40% of the GDP. So how this performs is fundamental to Chinese economy.

But there is a level of lack of confidence. To start with, the annual disposable growth rate is much slower compared to before. So last year was 5% the same level of GDP. Not like 8% or double-digit growth, right?

And on top of that, the unemployment rate is quite high and the youth unemployment is especially high. Depending on different surveys, whether it is official or some professors, the highest number I've seen for youth unemployment was 46% a couple of years ago, and this is enormous.

So imagine you're one of the consumers.

Ravi Velloor: 40%?

Qian Liu: Yes, for youth, right. So... Kids graduate from college, they don't have a job, right? So put yourself into their shoes, then your annual income is not really growing as much as before. On top of that, you have a much higher chance of getting unemployed. Of course you don't the confidence to spend.

And there's another side of that which is the wealth impact. So property market is very important to China. And according to some different surveys, the absolute majority of Chinese households own a house of some sort, so more than 90% of Chinese household own a house, and 20% of them own at least two houses or even more.

Now, when the property prices start to drop, that means all of a sudden I don't feel as rich as before. But when the price was going up before every day, even if I weren't doing anything, I was becoming richer. Of course I had the confidence to spend, but now I don't.

So when you put all these three together: I'm not earning as much or rapidly growth as before, I have higher risk of getting unemployed, and then I'm as rich as before. Obviously the confidence to spend is much lower than before.

So that is really the biggest challenge for the private consumption part.

And then finally it's the investment side. Whether it's infrastructure or property market or just sort of overall investment, physical investment, you know, all the companies' investment. We're also seeing that a level of uncertainty, whether it is caused by the external world or the lack of confidence, that is all feeding into that sentiment.

And then on top of that, interestingly, there are times I compare China with Silicon Valley in the sense that Silicon Valley is the place that we have venture capitals that we try a lot of different projects, right? And in China it's the same. Different provinces compete, different cities compete. So it's like a giant venture capital.

But the beauty of venture capital is that you have so many pipeline projects at the same time. And also the spirit is you fail fast and then you pivot fast. And that was in an essence how China was. Like people were encouraged to try different things. It's fine if you make mistakes, but then you try something else.

But right now the overall sentiment is not to make any mistakes. And what is, if you change that success or pivot fast, if you changed the KPI from that to make fewer mistakes, then what is the safe bet? The safer bet is not do anything. And that to me is something that is a big challenge, that sentiment change in China. So yeah, that's where China is.

Ravi Velloor: Sure, you know, in April 2020, I wrote a column in the Straits Times and it's called The Risks of Putting All Your Eggs in the China Basket, and one of the points I picked up in that column was the massive debt pile of China Evergrande, and I said, look, this doesn't look sustainable, and it reminds me of the early days of the Asian financial crisis and what happened to real estate.

But I've heard lately that a lot of that poison has left the system. Is there hope for a turnaround in Chinese property in the near future? Is there something that you see?

Qian Liu: I wouldn't put my money to bet on a high return of Chinese property market in the longer term.

There are certain positive factors that will continue to drive the Chinese property market, whether it is urbanisation rate, whether it is the growth in people's incomes, but they're also big factors to drag this down, for instance, whether the current stocks in certain regions are much higher compared to the actual demand, or we look at, you know, the major demographic shifts as such.

So property market would not be like sort of the fast-growing engine for Chinese economy going forward.

Ravi Velloor: Because I was talking to a major Australian property developer and they were talking about going into the elder care segment as a possible growth opportunity in the building for the elderly.

Robin Pomeroy: Just so you know, for anyone not following Asia quite as closely as both of you, the Evergrande affair was this Chinese property development company that got into a lot of trouble because of debt.

There's so much in in your initial answer I don't know what to come back for the first follow-up question. I thought of you said the impending trade war with Europe. I'm often curious of what is a trade war, because is there a trade war with the US at the moment? There's certainly been trade battles. Maybe, I don't know. But why do you think there's apparently an inevitable trade war with Europe?

Qian Liu: I hope I'm wrong, but perhaps instead of saying inevitable, I would say the very likely upcoming trade war with Europe, initiated by Europe.

I just came back from Europe and I'm more convinced and worried than ever about that.

So the trade, we'll call it trade war, trade frictions with the United States. You know, between these two countries, you're still seeing the the bans of rare earth or high-end chips and all of that. And you still see quite a level of tariffs on many products. So I would still call that a trade war, even if it's no longer 145%, right?

But with Europe it's different.

US and especially the Trump administration is very quote, quote, "practical" about this. So to President Trump, it's more a negotiation, his "art of the deal." So everything is about to come up with a number that he would be very happy about. And he can change it from the morning to the evening, but not so much about Europe.

The way I see it is that Europe is slowly cooking that negative sentiment about trade with China, about trade deficit with China. And that it takes quite some time for Europe to decide the actions, but once they do, it will stick. And when they do that, China will also retaliate.

And China cares more about the United States than any other countries. Unfortunately, in this case. And so China would retaliate, and then chances are Europe would add on top of that.

And the narratives are just changing. Before it was just about trade, and now it's changing into people are getting unemployed because of China. There's part of me almost hating to repeat this at the podcast because it only reinforces that, you know?

So there are two me at the moment. There's the me that is the economist me. Advising the world the risk are coming. There's the other me as a human and we know that psychologically the more we repeat something the chances are it will happen or the more you're scared about something chances are It will happen. And this is where I'm worried about.

There was a line in The Economist about how trying to look at the Europe, people both love it and hate it. People love it because they believe it's so true, they hate it because it's brutal. And I used to study and live in Europe, so there's part of me almost don't want to say it. But the line was that Europe is being seen as an ageing concubine that has not accepted the fact that it's been ditched by the American Emperor.

So as someone who studied and lived there, Europe is like my second home. It pains me to say that. And I certainly do not hope that we will see that trade war between Europe and China.

Robin Pomeroy: Like any war, like a hot war, you can see a buildup of arms and then someone goes over the top and the war actually starts. Do you know when it's going to happen and do you know what will be the first battle? Is it going to be about a certain product or product lines and is this going to happen in the next six months, in the two years?

Qian Liu: Technically, it already happened. I mean, Europe imposed certain tariffs and barriers for Chinese EV cars, and China's retaliation also took on certain things such as agriculture and also Cognac, for instance.

When you look at this, it's so interesting because EV is less than 1% of the trade between Europe and China. Less than 1%, but it's becoming the dominant talk about the Chinese trade with Europe, right? So China's retaliation is almost like so perfectly engineered to go against that versus one of that was cognac because cognac, it has to be cognac from the region of cognac in France which is so typically European and it's also less than I think like, and it is also less than 1% of the total trade between Europe and China.

So China has engineered this beautifully. So, technically it's already happened, but more are being discussed as we speak. So later this year, I think there's a very high likelihood that we're going to see more actions from Brussels.

Ravi Velloor: I know the Chinese, too, love their Cognac, but have they tried Armagnac as a substitute?

Qian Liu: I'm not an expert on alcohol, so I can't comment on that. I like bubble tea better.

Robin Pomeroy: Maybe the Armagnac producers should be lobbying Beijing for the Cognac.

Ravi Velloor: Can I just ask you a question because you talked about trade and how Chinese trade as a factor of Chinese GDP has actually come down significantly.

But you know, we in Southeast Asia, we are very sensitive to China, China's economy. We want the Chinese economy to do well because it helps us as well, you know, but one of the issues we're having is that, look, you did mention that trade as a percentage of GDP has come down, but we're talking about a much bigger-

Qian Liu: Export as a percentage.

Ravi Velloor: Export as the percentage of the GDP has came down, but we are talking about much bigger Chinese economy.

Now, this morning, Premier Li Qiang said, please don't talk about the second China shock. You know, I think he said that in his speech. But the fact is that China's got so good at manufacturing and maybe you don't have much of an option because as you said investment is slowing and consumption is, for whatever reason, is taking a breather. But the Chinese export push, especially after the U.S. markets became a little constrained, into Southeast Asia is causing a lot of grief in Southeast Asia.

In Indonesia we have had significant losses in the textile industry and the Chinese are actually selling batik shirts to Indonesia. In Malaysia, the furniture industry is in crisis because the Chinese exports are so good. Thai auto industry is also in trouble.

Is there something, because we remember China when we signed the ASEAN-China FTA China gave us an early harvest which helped all the Asean economies.

But today, because of your own domestic constraints, are you compelled to keep pushing the exports out into the world, including in Europe, you know, to come back to where you started? Is that a factor that, you do need to find jobs for the people? 45% youth unemployment is a frightening number, you know. The last I heard that number was in the Indian context. I thought China was much lower than that, 28%. But what you said certainly surprised me.

What do you think? What do you think China can do so that it doesn't kill the goose of consumption in the surrounding economies that are so critical to it.

Qian Liu: Yeah, that's a really good question and there are few faux that we can look at this and to start with when I say, you know export doesn't matter to China that much I meant from the Chinese economy perspective as the question went, but I certainly understand the level of sort of concern the rest of the world would have.

And even say that five percent of of GDP growth that China enjoys every year, that is -- every year, China produces a new country that is the size of Switzerland or Saudi Arabia. So that is enormous. And last year, trade surplus was 1.2 trillion. That is absolutely enormous.

So I understand this. But perhaps let me try to reframe it and also how, in a way, China looks at this, and then we can talk about how China decides to make this more sustainable.

I have an analogy that when we think about Chinese manufacturing, think about China is a shop that sells ice creams, okay, imagine vanilla ice creams. And as you said, China feels like it's so good, let me try to do the President Trump way, is so good and so cheap, and that you buy so much out of China and you get fat. And then you complain to China, and you say it's China's fault that you're becoming so fat. And China's like, wait a second, you have every right not to buy us. You buy it not because we force it on you, but because we're so good and so cheap. So who is the one to blame here?

So when we talk about trade surpluses, deficits, there's part of China feels a bit vulnerable in the sense that we would love to buy more from you, but what do you have to sell to us?

I'm looking at certain interviewees...

Robin Pomeroy: No, but we're back with trade wars that, so governments could say, OK, it is great goods from China, but we're getting fat, to use your analogy. We'll put up trade barriers. Isn't that the inevitable conclusion?

Ravi Velloor: Some people might say that we need to get more time to be as fit as you are.

Qian Liu: That would be a healthier way.

So protections are for the weak. Rather than say, I'm going to not buy your ice creams, you can also say, I'm going to produce better ice creams that are tastier and cheaper. So that would be the other way around.

As always, as trained economists, as sensible as we are, we know that tariffs are bad, protections are for the weak.

So that's something I want to argue. But then to go back to your question about how sustainable this is, in fact, China itself realises that this is not sustainable. And there are different Chinas. So when we talk about you, China, what is that you? Is it the government? Is it a business? Is it the Chinese people? The answers are completely different on this.

For all of these, all of the above, whether the government or the business or the Chinese people, we know that it's not sustainable, for instance, when you look at the much younger people, there's this phenomenon called lying flat. The young generation believe that is much more important to be happy rather than work hard and make money. But i'm from the generation where when i grew up we had very little food I couldn't have like meat in my dumplings, only on Chinese New Year, right so it's a completely different kind of mentality so when you are a lot more well off then you don't bother to work as hard anymore.

That is part of the reason why this is not going to be sustainable because the younger generation would be different.

And then on top of it is that the business realised that this is no sustainable. When we visit some of the Chinese companies in different cities and regions, we see that right after COVID, they were extra working hard, even if they were losing money. And I asked them, why is that? Because there are two different concepts of cost. There is the average and fixed cost. There is a marginal cost. So if they have invested all this machinery and everything, even if the marginal cost, so long as the money they make is higher than the marginal costs, they are happy to continue to do that, the simple answer they said to me is, I know I'm losing money. But if I don't, I would lose out even more money. So that's why they were doing it.

But already, especially since last year, we're seeing that this so-called involution, the extra competitiveness among Chinese companies themselves are starting to change. So the business realised themselves that this is not sustainable. So they're changing that organically without the interference with the government or with people from the rest of the world.

And Chinese government also realises this. I mean, that's why, as you said, the prime minister mentioned that. The China shock is the wrong way to put it, that the China opportunity is really the right way to put it. The government has all this pressure from Europe, from, you know, Latin America, etc. They want China to buy more, to reduce that trade deficit, and China will look to do that.

And for instance, one of that would be service account, right? Because typically when we talk about trade surplus, we just think about goods per se, but depending how you want to play around the numbers for the argument, if anything, the service account trade deficit that China runs, it almost increased by seven times in the last five years' time. So it depends how we frame this.

Robin Pomeroy: I just wanted to mention the Strait of Hormuz effect on China. I've been interested to hear Ravi as well, the impact that's had in Southeast Asia where you're based.

What impact has it had on China? Because I've spoken to several Chinese people who've said actually we've been pretty insulated from it because of electrification of our cars and the fact we're producing so much renewable energy here.

How do you see it? And do you think it's a game changer? Will it change anything in terms of the bigger picture on anything in China.

Qian Liu: Economically, it hasn't impacted China that much. It's more on the political and geopolitical front.

Less than 50% of China's import of oil go through the Straits, whether it's import from Iran, Iraq, Saudi, et cetera. So that is quite a bit of share. But, on the other hand, oil is only about 6% or 7% of total China energy use. So the impact that has brought directly on China is much less compared to, for instance, Europe, right?

And then on top of that, China has an oil storage about seven months or so.

So this really like, if you ask citizens on the street, you ask a random person, they feel a bit, not so much.

But more importantly is the idea that this is changing and giving the world a different perspective of the current Trump administration and how it is really disrupting and shaking people's faith in the U.S. leadership of the world. And that China is watching it more enthusiastically.

Ravi Velloor: Since you spoke about US leadership, how much of a watershed has this year, 2026, been in global affairs? You saw a very, I don't want to say timid, but a very respectful, polite Donald Trump show up in Beijing. How much has the world changed for China this year.

Qian Liu: So from the U.S. geopolitical perspective, yes, so much has changed.

I mean, you know, we start the year by seeing U.S. taking President Maduro from Venezuela and then President Trump keep on insisting and be even more assertive on Greenland, for instance, right? And then we had Iran, and then we have President Trump visiting China.

So to China somewhat, this year was more about watching U.S. destroying itself and its allies globally.

You're absolutely right that President Trump visited China and he called President Xi a great leader, incredible China and all of that. But China is naive in the sense that it believes this will be the bilateral relationship going forward.

The very reason why President Trump turned his stance and style with China is because China showed the rare earth card. And President Trump is someone that believes in the games of power and China showed his hand and that was very critical.

So the fact that the two countries are smiling at each other and shaking hands certainly do not mean that this will be the great relationship you know romantic honeymoon going forward but at least before the midterm the bilateral relationship would be very stable and depending on how the mid term goes President Trump may adopt a different strategy on China, or maybe not.

So for instance. Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Palestine, Iran, all of these is distracting the US from its priority on China. It's just got its hands so full at the moment, it's got no attention or ability, really, in a way, at least trade-wise to take on China.

But that is just trade. The bilateral relationship goes so much more beyond just trade. There's technology rivalry. Military security rivalry and there is financial rivalry, so I believe the ongoing frictions between US-China will be one of the key defining themes in the world.

Ravi Velloor: So it's not ended, the story, that story is not ended.

Qian Liu: Oh no, this is just the beginning of the beginning. Of the beginning.

Ravi Velloor: It's just the beginning, and do you think in about five years from now, when the Americans fix their vulnerability on rare earths, that fear of China will suddenly go away?

Qian Liu: To start with, there is no way that U.S. will be able to catch up with China's level of dominance on rare earths in five years, because you talk about five years.

When we talk about the dominance in rare earths, there's the access to the resources itself, and there is also the capacity to produce and process them. So China has the absolute dominant power on both sides. So the U.S. will not be able to replace China for at least another 10 years or so. And Europe everywhere. Yeah, so that's why people are concerned about, you know, interdependence of supply chains and all of that.

But on the rare earths, can I just say, it's actually very important to know that China didn't want to play the rare earth card. So, you know, Europe is quite concerned about China continuing to use this.

Let me emphasise again that China did not want to pay the rare earth card. If it wanted to, It would have played this a long time ago. In fact, it's almost a public knowledge. Everybody knows about it. So the question should really be, people know that China has access and dominance of this. Why did they not think China can do? Because China never played this card.

Chairman Deng Xiaoping said decades ago that the Middle East has oil and China has rare earth. This is no secret. China could have played. China could've played this 40 years ago. China could have played this in the first Trump administration, it did not. China could have played immediately on Liberation Day. China did not.

China played the rare earth card when the back and forth of the tariffs war negotiations between the two countries, which is dragging on and on and back and fourth and almost with higher than expected or would like kind of risks, that was when China decided enough is enough. Like no is no. That is when China played the card.

China never wanted to because look at this, one of the consequences, Europe and many other regions got scared and say, we're worried that China might want to play it. China does not. If anything, China is still, as Prime Minister Li Qiang called this morning, China still wants a very stable global economy and China is is still very committed and wants a good globalisation and economic globalisation because China benefits from that.

So China doesn't want any trade wars whatsoever.

Ravi Velloor: Do you think China has a similar dominance in active pharmaceutical ingredients, APIs, as they have in rare earths.

Qian Liu: I'm not an expert on that specific industries, but my limited knowledge is that it's not, but it's certainly getting more power than before.

I mean, one of my favourite example is that we have, there's this Chinese company who the founder was, I forgot, Harvard or MIT educated. So she set up the company in Boston, a brilliant hub for biomedicine related. But especially during COVID time, so she came back and over time, she took the team back with her. So now they're headquarters in China with all the R&D centres in China and only the sales and marketing teams in the U.S. Because they know the language, they know how to sell.

And this is a great example telling us. Because when people think Chinese manufacturers, a few years ago it was about EV, and then it was AI, DeepSeek. And now we're looking at robotics. The next is very likely to be biotech.

Robin Pomeroy: I did want to ask you about the gender gap. The World Economic Forum produces every year the Global Gender Gap report. I know it's something you've taken a great interest in. You mentioned your book on the subject has become so successful. What's happened to it?

Qian Liu: Yes, so I wrote a book on gender economics in Mandarin at the moment. It got so popular that there are pirated copies now.

Robin Pomeroy: Right? People are clamouring for it.

Qian Liu: Because the rise of female power is, you know, I talk about the rise of China is one of the key defining themes of the century and the rise of female powers is another one.

Robin Pomeroy: How do you tell companies or governments that it's in their interest to address the gender gap?

Qian Liu: Well, because it's good for the women and the men and the children and the economy.

So let me take one example. So there are studies looking at the world in the past 46 years. And basically, if you put a dollar on investment on the US bonds and stock market, your annual return was 2.4%. But if you invest that in people's education, every additional year of education, the average return is about 8.8%.

That means investing into human capital gives you a lot higher yield than financial capital. And within this 8.8%, the returns to women education is 10%, which means that it's guaranteed that when you invest more in women, the women make more.

On top of that, there's a study in the U.S. showing that when the wife's education grows by an additional year, the husband makes an additional somewhere between 18% to 23%. So that's great for the men as well.

And on top of, that we see that when the women are better educated, the kids are taller, they're healthier, they have better performance at school. So that's good for the next generation as well.

And then on top of that is actually very good for the economic growth. So for instance, according to UN Women, they have a finding suggesting that when we invest more in women that can significantly increase the global GDP by about four trillion US dollars by 2030. And that is more than 3% of the current GDP that we have.

So that's why I say educating the women is great for everybody, for women, for the men, for the kids, and for the society and the economy.

Ravi Velloor: But Qian, you were born in Shandong, right?

Qian Liu: Yes

Ravi Velloor: And that is known to be a fairly traditional Chinese society in Shandong, if I'm not mistaken. Did you get lucky? Where did you get your fantastic education in Europe? How did you manage to do it? Were your parents farsighted, or they just wanted you to have the best?

Qian Liu: Yes, so I was born in Qingdao, in Shandong, where Confucius came from. It's very traditional, so even nowadays in certain parts of Shandong, women are not allowed to dine at the same table with men. And that whenever we go out, you're supposed to give men the face, let them talk more, let them take the lead, you know, you smile and clap when they do the talk.

So that was one side of me. And then I had the opportunity to study in Sweden, one of the most gender equal countries in the world, and also at UC Berkeley, the most sort of progressive university.

So I got very lucky in that I saw that gender equality can be very different and that they are possible. So one of my PhD theses, well, the majority of them were about labour economics, even though later I dived into, you know, macroeconomics, geopolitical economics, da-da-da. But one of my PhD theses was about labour economics, human capital, da da da. And one of that was to study, is it true that when women are better educated, we have a lower marriage rate?

Because back then, there was a saying in China that there are three kinds of people in the world, a man and a woman and a women who has a PhD. And I was getting my PhD. And there were another saying that, there are four kinds of people in the world, a man, a woman, a women who has a PhD and a man who dares to marry the third type. So I wanted to prove them wrong. So that's how like gradually over time, apart from my day-to-day work on geopolitics, advising the world on China and Chinese companies going overseas, I've spent the past more than a decade writing along the topic of gender economics. And I'm very lucky because my parents believe in the power of education and they let me take my PhD.

Ravi Velloor: Do you think there might be a future book from you called A Man's Place is in the Home?

Qian Liu: Um, I like the idea, but I want to rephrase it to a man's place is wherever he wishes.

Because when we talk about gender equality, the idea is not to sort of let women become the more senior species in gender than men. We want equality. And the idea of equality is not that women should work and men should stay home, but women can work, if she chooses so, and the man can stay at home if he chooses so.

So, ultimately, I believe the definition of gender equality is not about the same results, but that we have the same access and same opportunity. So men can cry. Men can wear pink However, you know you can play Barbie dolls. We can also become supermans as well.

Robin Pomeroy: I'm wearing pink, did you see that? Did you see that?

Qian Liu: And it's lovely. And I did not mean objectifying you.

Robin Pomeroy: At least I've not cried during this interview. We have to bring it to a close there.

That's all we've got time for. Ravi, it's been great to co-host this with you. If your listeners, if your audience want to follow Radio Davos, they can find us on any podcast app. They can also go to wef.ch/podcasts, where you'll find we have three weekly podcasts, this one, Radio Davos, Meet the Leader and Agenda Dialogues

Ravi, where can we find you?

Ravi Velloor: Robin, that's been a fantastic conversation. And thank you, Qian, for a brilliant presentation. We didn't talk enough of concubines yet, but maybe we'll do that for the next session.

This is Ravi Velloor for the Straits Times Asian Insider podcast.

Qian Liu: That's a great pleasure. Thank you for having me today.