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Data from the China Bicycle Association shows that China's bicycle ownership rate has topped 200 million, with an additional 380 million electric-powered two-wheelers in use, bolstering low-carbon travel.
Chinese urbanites use bicycles or e-bikes for around £30 out of every 100 trips they make.
The figures point to a shift in China, where growing environmental awareness is prompting more commuters to opt for two-wheeled, low-carbon alternatives, according to estimates from the Association.
Two-wheeled travel reduces carbon emissions in China by about 10000 tonnes per day, the equivalent of saving roughly 66 million litres of petrol.
In many parts of China, napping is a common post-lunch recharge practice, similar to Spain's siesta.
Yet classroom napping has proved problematic.
With limited space and non-adjustable traditional desks, most students could only doze off by leaning on their desks.
Now, nap-friendly furniture offers a solution.
Adjustable backrests and cushions can create a comfortable angle of over 150 degrees, far more suitable for lying down.
Also, headrests are retractable, while leg rests allow students to stretch their legs.
Such focus on better midday naps stems from China's recognition that adequate rest boosts students' health and academic performance.
More primary and secondary schools are adopting nap-friendly furniture.
For example, Ganzhou in East China's Jiangxi Province plans to equip 68 schools with over 20000 sets of nap-friendly desks this year.
Meanwhile, in Fenghua in East China's Zhejiang Province, Schools have received more than 20000 sets of napping facilities for the autumn term.
As the use of such furniture increases, China's State Administration for Market Regulation has released technical standards to ensure safety and comfort.
Taking effect next February.
The standards recommend reclining chairs with an overall length of at least 1050 mm, a backrest tilt of over 135 degrees and ample under-desk space for free leg movement.
Tung Shin, an orthopaedic expert at the Children's Hospital of Zhejiang University's School of Medicine, said that when adjusted to more than 135 degrees neck, back and waist muscles rest better, reducing fatigue in spinal muscles and supporting bone development.
Xiong Bingqi, an education researcher, noted that these standards are significant in keeping substandard items off campuses and improving students' napping.
In Nanjing, in East China's Jiangsu Province, young innovators from China and Italy are collaborating to blend heritage preservation with creative design, breathing new life into one of the world's most storied fortifications.
Nanjing's Ming City Wall, built more than 650 years ago, stretches approximately 25 kilometres, making it one of the longest, largest and best-preserved city walls still standing in the world.
Once a formidable military barrier, it now looms as a cultural monument, a symbol of memory and identity, in the heart of a bustling city.
Like many cities in the world with ancient walls, Nanjing faces the challenge of turning the relic into a vibrant part of daily life.
That challenge inspired the launch of Futuring Our Wallscapes, a joint design camp that opened recently in Nanjing.
The programme has brought together students from Nanjing University, South East University, Italy's Polytechnic University of Turin and the University of Florence, aiming to spark creative solutions that both protect the wall and weave it into contemporary urban living.
The initiative is part of a broader China-Italy collaboration, Shared Heritage, Shared World, launched in March during celebrations of the 45th anniversary of Nanjing's sister city ties with Italy's Florence.
In September, the students with backgrounds spanning architecture, urban planning, Landscape Design, as well as Heritage Conservation and Digital Arts, have conducted field work around the wall and its historic neighbourhoods.
Their goal is to create proposals ranging from public art installations to service facilities that will allow the ancient structure to better connect with the modern city.
By November, the Sino-Italian teams will present their design proposals in a public exhibition.
Their work will be reviewed by global leading experts in heritage preservation, aiming to bring some of the ideas to life along the wall itself.
Breaking from models like ChatGPT, a team of Chinese researchers has developed a novel AI system that mimics brain neurons, charting a new course for next-generation energy-efficient computing and hardware.
Scientists from the Institute of Automation under the Chinese Academy of Sciences introduced Spiking Brain 10, a large-scale model trained and inferred entirely by on home-grown GPU computing.
Unlike mainstream generative AI systems that rely on the resource-intensive transformer architecture where intelligence grows with ever-larger networks, computing budgets and datasets, The novel model pursues a different path, allowing intelligence to emerge from spiking neurons.
With event-driven spiking neurons at the interference stage.
One spiking brain variant is shown to deliver a 265-fold speed-up over transformer architectures when generating the first token from a one million token context.
The model's ability to handle ultra-long sequences offers clear efficiency gains for tasks such as legal or medical document analysis, high-energy particle physics experiments and DNA sequence modelling.
The research team has open-sourced the spiking brain model and launched a public test page, along with releasing a large-scale, industry-validated bilingual technical report.
Xu Bo, director of the Institute of Automation, said this large model opens up a non-transformer technical path for the new generation of AI development and it might inspire the design of next generation AI neuromorphic chips with lower power consumption.
This is Special English.
Once a village with little industry and few means of livelihood, Zhuangzi Tian in southwest China's Yunnan Province has blossomed into the country's largest hub of cactus cultivation, boasting the highest output value in the country.
In August, 20 tonnes of edible cactus leaves were exported from the village to South East Asian countries, marking China's first ever shipment of edible cactus abroad.
In the past, rocky desertification from the karst landscape left 80 of the village's land barren, driving most young people to seek work elsewhere.
Yet on the white rocky hills, cacti have thrived for more than 200 years, growing with remarkable resilience.
The cactus's ability to thrive in poor soil and withstand drought makes it a natural saviour for the rocky, desertified mountains.
Its thick leaves are packed with dietary fibre, minerals and vitamins, finding wide use in food and beverages, medicine and cosmetics.
Lu Chunhong, the village head, recognised the market potential of cacti.
In 2021, under Lu's leadership, the village set up a collective company, contributing all village land as shares and turning residents into shareholders to jointly cultivate cacti.
In 2022, the cacti bore fruit.
With 1500 mu, around 100 hectares of cacti, producing 260 tons of fresh fruit, generating sales revenue exceeding 5 million yuan, some 700000 US dollars.
The industrial chain is also continuing to expand.
In 2023, Yi Mu Liang Tian Yunnan Agricultural Investment Company set up operations in the village, launching a full industrial chain for edible cactus.
The comprehensive development of the industrial chain has greatly boosted local employment, according to Chen Shao-ke, general manager of the company.
It has directly created over 1000 jobs and indirectly helped 36000 farmer households increase their income, with their annual income rising from 32000 yuan in 2021 to 103000 yuan in 2024.
Last year, the village collectively planted over 5,000 mu of cacti.
The comprehensive output value of the industrial chain soared to 1732 million yuan, with cactus leaves flowers honey, oil and derivative products jointly forming a diverse income structure.
Meanwhile, the industrial model has continued to evolve, deeply integrating cactus cultivation with Yi ethnic culture and rural leisure.
In July this year, The village hosted its first cultural tourism festival, centred on cacti, drawing more than 40000 visitors from across the country.
Liu revealed future plans to transform the cactus industry from merely selling fruit to offering an experience of ecology and culture.
This is Special English.
China is set to launch a three-year nationwide campaign to strengthen bird protection.
The campaign will primarily focus on enhancing the conservation of birds and their habitats, combating illegal hunting and promoting public awareness.
The initiative was jointly issued by 17 government bodies, including the National Forestry and Grassland Administration.
China will enhance field patrols and monitoring efforts for birds.
Patrols will be fully insured across the four major migratory flyways passing through China and 1140 key sites and areas with frequent bird activity.
The country will advance the development of a bird protection and monitoring network, conduct wintering water bird surveys and restore critical habitats.
China will tighten the management of artificial bird breeding and intensify crackdowns on illegal activities such as bird poaching, and public awareness efforts will also be expanded, including a variety of educational activities aimed at fostering a culture of loving and protecting birds.
As one of the countries with the richest bird diversity in the world.
China is home to more than 1500 bird species, or 13 of the world's total, and more than 800 of them are migratory.
Four of the nine major migratory flyways globally pass through the country.
China attaches great importance to bird conservation and has implemented a range of initiatives.
These efforts have yielded significant progress, with notable improvements in bird habitats and overall biodiversity conservation.
The number of overwintering waterfowl in China reached a record high.
That is the end of this edition of Special English.
To recap, I'm going to read one of the news items again at normal speed.
Please listen carefully.
In many parts of China, napping is a common post-lunch recharge practice, similar to Spain's siesta.
Yet classroom napping has proved problematic.
With limited space and non-adjustable traditional desks, most students could only doze off by leaning on their desks.
Now, nap-friendly furniture offers a solution.
Adjustable backrests and cushions can create a comfortable angle of over 150 degrees, far more suitable for lying down.
Also, headrests are retractable, while legrests allow students to stretch their legs.
Such focus on better midday naps stems from China's recognition that adequate rest boosts students' health and academic performance.
More primary and secondary schools are adopting nap-friendly furniture.
For example, Ganzhou in East China's Jiangxi Province plans to equip 68 schools with over 20000 sets of nap-friendly desks this year.
Meanwhile, in Fenghua in East China's Zhejiang province, schools have received more than 20000 sets of napping facilities for the autumn term.
As the use of such furniture increases, China's State Administration for Market Regulation has released technical standards to ensure safety and comfort, taking effect next February.
The standards recommend reclining chairs with an overall length of at least 1050 mm, a backrest tilt of over 135 degrees and ample under-desk space for free leg movement.
Tung Shin, an orthopaedic expert at the Children's Hospital of Zhejiang University School of Medicine, said that when adjusted to more than 135 degrees neck, back and waist muscles rest better, reducing fatigue of spinal muscles and supporting bone development.
Xiongbing Qi, an education researcher, noted that these standards are significant in keeping substandard items off campuses and improving students' napping.
That is the end of today's programme.
I hope you'll join us every day to learn English at a slower pace.
With a history of 5000 years, it's no surprise that China has created a fabulous treasury of folktales.
Once a year, on the seventh day of the seventh month, all the magpies fly up to heaven and form a bridge.
So many amazing worlds to discover.
I want a new palace, said King Mu of Zhou one day.
Chinese folktales retold for audiences today.
Will you marry me? he asked.
And with little hesitation, she said, Yes!
Five thousand years of amazing Chinese folk tales.
My father must not go to war.
Someone must take his place.
You'll find Chinese Folk Tales Season 3 wherever you discover your favorite podcasts.
CGTN Radio is proud to present Sweetness on the Plateau, a radio drama inspired by the true story of a visionary farmer from Shandong who carried not only seeds but dreams to the rooftop of the world.
Then let's do it!
Let's make his step!
Follow a determined team as they scale the razor-sharp peaks of Tangula.
Where's that gonna end?
Brave, relentless blizzards to build greenhouses and achieve the impossible turning the barren plateau into a garden of miracles.
We did it!
It's solid.
Tune in to sweetness on the plateau.
A powerful story of resilience, hope and the human spirit blooming against all odds.
We made sweetness happen.
Available now on CGTN radio and all major podcast platforms.
