Arvind's Newsletter

1. The incipient global recession has begun to affect India. In December, India’s merchandise exports declined 12.2% to $34.5 billion, from a year ago, according to government data released yesterday (Jan. 16). This marked the second contraction in three months, owing to a slowdown in demand. Imports also shrank, albeit at a slower pace of 3.5%, to $58.2 billion. India’s commerce ministry is doing a “country-wise as well as commodity-wise” analysis to boost exports, the Financial Times reported today, quoting commerce secretary Sunil Bharthwal. The government is seeking indigenisation and modernisation of its defence sector, too.

2.China’s population declined for the first time since the 1960s, when it was devastated by famine triggered by Mao Zedong’s Great Leap Forward. The country — long the world’s most populous — is expected to be overtaken by India within months. The decline is widely attributed to decades of China’s now-abandoned one-child policy. But it is also due to an array of other factors including young people marrying later and struggling to balance work and family life, as well as the growing appeal of a childless lifestyle. Also, China’s economy grew just 3% last year, one of its slowest rates in decades, hammered by its COVID-19 restrictions. Yet despite Beijing’s sudden abandonment of zero-COVID, which has battered its fragile health care system and left huge numbers dead, China’s economy remains a source of global optimism: Goldman Sachs recently upgraded its growth projections, foreign investors are rushing to buy Chinese stocks, and analysts are upbeat on the credentials of Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s economic team, including the new premier, who oversaw Shanghai’s lockdown debacle last year.

3.Electric vehicles accounted for 10% of global auto sales in 2022, preliminary research shows. Some researchers predict the EV industry's market share will double or even quadruple by 2030. In the near term, however, there are some signs of slowing demand for electric vehicles in the US.While Tesla's stock is tanking, the electric vehicle industry appears to have achieved a key milestone ahead of schedule last year, and it could be poised to surpass even more expectations in the decade ahead.

4. Two-thirds of those surveyed for the World Economic Forum’s Chief Economists Outlook expect a global recession in 2023, see geopolitical tensions continuing to shape the global economy, and anticipate further monetary tightening in the United States and Europe. Businesses expected to cut costs significantly in response to economic headwinds. Chief economists optimistic about inflation and strong balance sheets. In China, expectations of growth are polarised, with respondents almost evenly split between those who expect weak or strong growth. Recent moves to unwind the country’s highly restrictive zero-COVID policy are expected to deliver a boost to growth, but it remains to be seen how disruptive the policy shift will be, particularly in terms of its health impacts.

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5. Researchers successfully diverted lightning using a high-powered laser in the first demonstration of the technique outside a laboratory. Scientists believe the technology could eventually help control lightning strikes around airports and launchpads while potentially reducing the thousands of fatalities and $3B in damages each year resulting from the phenomenon.

Traditional metal lightning rods only cover an area as wide as the rod is tall, limiting their application on large sites. To test covering a wider area, the researchers created a virtual lightning rod using a laser pulsing 1,000 times per second near a 400-foot tower in Switzerland. During storms in the summer of 2021, the laser's rapid beams heated a path of charged air near the tower, ultimately steering four lightning strikes through the ionized channel over six hours. Observers believe the car-sized laser will require more research before it is commercially available.