China is a global leader in automation, leading to fears that millions of workers, particularly in the manufacturing sector, are set to lose their jobs to robots.
The march of the robots stalled globally last year — except, that is, in China.
Sales of industrial robots in the world’s second-largest economy jumped 19 percent in 2020, according to recent data from the International Federation of Robotics, compared with a slight 2 percent decline in overall global sales. The sharp rise has consolidated China’s position as a global leader in automation: even in 2019, before the Covid-19 pandemic hit, the country installed more robots than the next fo
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