Positive pointer to how to shape a better year

THE only thing certain about 2025 is uncertainty.

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And uncertainty poses the foremost threat to countries' economic health, which thrives on optimistic anticipations, and deteriorates otherwise.

The revival of the China-United Kingdom Economic and Financial Dialogue over the weekend, after its suspension since 2019, was a choice of strategic foresight by the two countries that promises profound mutual benefits.

Under consecutive years of Conservative leadership in the UK, economic and trade relations between the two countries had been hijacked by a "national security" narrative, echoing that of the Joe Biden administration in the United States, resulting in a frosty overall relationship. Even as Chancellor Rachel Reeves of the UK Treasury came to Beijing for the Dialogue, her visit was caricatured by the opposition as a return to "operation kowtow".