New development: Is China’s local government debt problem getting better or worse?

IMPACTAs the world deals with the Covid-19 pandemic, debt risks are increasing, as is the pressure to hide debt. The lessons learnt from analysing the progress made by China in controlling hidden debt will be of use to accountants, financial managers and policy-makers in other countries. The authors also make suggestions for the Chinese local and central government going forward.China’s central government has been addressing the country’s local government hidden debt since 2015 with the introduction of a ‘New Budget Law’ to make the debt explicit (transparent). The authors discuss the progress made, the continuing systemic risk of hidden debt, and the impacts of central government action on debt costs and funding opportunities. This paper adds to the literature on the management of general government debt.

Significant changes in the chemical compositions and sources of PM2.5 in Wuhan since the city lockdown as COVID-19.

Wuhan was the first city to adopt the lockdown measures to prevent COVID-19 spreading, which improved the air quality accordingly. This study investigated the variations in chemical compositions, source contributions, and regional transport of fine particles (PM2.5) during January 23-February 22 of 2020, compared with the same period in 2019. The average mass concentration of PM2.5 decreased from 72.9 µg m-3 (2019) to 45.9 µg m-3 (2020), by 27.0 µg m-3. It was predominantly contributed by the emission reduction (92.0%), retrieved from a random forest tree approach. The main chemical species of PM2.5 all decreased with the reductions ranging from 0.85 µg m-3 (chloride) to 9.86 µg m-3 (nitrate) (p < 0.01). Positive matrix factorization model indicated that the mass contributions of seven PM2.5 sources all decreased. However, their contribution percentages varied from -11.0% (industrial processes) to 8.70% (secondary inorganic aerosol). Source contributions of PM2.5 transported from potential geographical regions showed reductions with mean values ranging from 0.22 to 4.36 µg m-3. However, increased contributions of firework burning, secondary inorganic aerosol, road dust, and vehicle emissions from transboundary transport were observed. This study highlighted the complex and nonlinear response of chemical compositions and sources of PM2.5 to air pollution control measures, suggesting the importance of regional-joint control.