[Explanation] Recently, H&M Group, a foreign apparel company, issued a statement to boycott Xinjiang cotton products, causing public outrage.

At present, many domestic e-commerce platforms have removed H&M related products.

What is the position of China's cotton industry in the world?

What role does Xinjiang cotton play in it?

Is there so-called "forced labor" and "religious discrimination" in Xinjiang's cotton industry?

Will the boycott affect Xinjiang cotton production?

On March 25, the reporter interviewed Hu Bingbing, director of the Agricultural Products Trade and Policy Research Office of the Rural Development Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences on related issues.

  [Concurrent] Hu Bingbing, Director of Agricultural Trade and Policy Research Office, Rural Development Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

  Everyone always thinks that China is a big cotton-producing country in the world, and we also import a large amount of cotton, but in fact, our annual export of textiles exceeds China's domestic cotton supply.

However, our export is rigid, that is to say, if we add up the production capacity of the countries that we are transferring to the gradient, it is very likely that they will not be able to meet this kind of international demand downstream.

Some people always want to say, “Oh, I’ve boycotted such a cotton in Xinjiang or don’t consume it. On the whole, we objectively judge this is neither a commercial nor a political act. This is actually What is it, it is actually an anti-intellectual behavior.

  [Explanation] Regarding the claims of the Swiss Better Cotton Development Association (BCI) and H&M Group that "China Xinjiang has the risk of human rights violations and forced labor", Hu Bingbing said that this is nonsense.

  [Concurrent] Hu Bingbing, Director of Agricultural Trade and Policy Research Office, Rural Development Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

  In the past, when cotton was harvested every year in the fall, the Central Plains region, such as Zhengzhou, would set up a special train called cotton picking to export these laborers from the central region to Xinjiang to pick cotton.

If you want forced labor, what is the point of exporting a large amount of labor from the Central Plains to Xinjiang to pick cotton?

In the past two years, large-scale mechanization has started. After a decade of development, I have seen the latest data. Probably, the area of ​​mechanization should be close to 50% now.

If you want forced labor, then what are we going to do with mechanization?

Let's just force labor. The labor cost is zero. This is nonsense.

  [Explanation] Hu Bingchuan introduced that during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, China's exports to European textiles increased by 130% in order to support the world's fight against the epidemic and to produce anti-epidemic materials at full capacity, which claimed to boycott Chinese cotton and Chinese cotton textile products. The country is precisely the biggest beneficiary of Chinese textiles.

  [Concurrent] Hu Bingbing, Director of Agricultural Trade and Policy Research Office, Rural Development Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

  Last year, we talked about China's entire cotton textile products. Among foreign trade exports, according to the statistics of the national customs, there was an increase of about 8%.

The export of textiles is mainly due to anti-epidemic materials. Our textile exports to Europe increased by 130% last year. These countries claim to boycott Chinese cotton and Chinese cotton textile products. Such countries are precisely the biggest beneficiaries of Chinese textiles.

If there is no such huge export volume of China's cotton or China's textile industry, it will not be able to support the world's widest range of anti-epidemic activities.

  [Explanation] Regarding whether this incident will affect Xinjiang's cotton production and China's cotton textile industry, Hu Bingbing said that there is absolutely nothing to worry about.

  [Concurrent] Hu Bingbing, Director of Agricultural Trade and Policy Research Office, Rural Development Institute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

  It didn't have much impact, because we said that our own cotton is not enough in China.

We have to export cotton, actually.

It is the national support policy that has a greater impact on Xinjiang cotton, rather than the strategies of these distributors.

But for H&M and BCI (Swiss Better Cotton Development Association), it may be a loss of the Chinese market. This is a reality.

From a longer-term perspective, I think H&M and BCI (Swiss Better Cotton Development Association) will regret in the future. What they regret is not necessarily that they have lost the Chinese market economically, but that they cannot use an objective and correct value. Measure real problems.

When it finds that its past thinking is flawed, then I think it will regret it.

  Dong Zeyu reports from Beijing

Editor in charge: [Bian Liqun]