The Chinese government plans to set up a five-year scholarship program for EU students from 2007, with 100 recipients per year, providing more opportunities for overseas students to learn Chinese.

 

Premier Wen Jiabao made this point during the 9th EU-China Summit meeting with Matti Vanhanen, prime minister of Finland, and Jose Manuel Durao Barroso, president of the EU Commission, in Helsinki on September 9. They agreed that educational cooperation forms the social and literary basis in promoting further development of EU-China relations.

 

China is to sign a set of agreements with the EU on educational communication and cooperation in the near future, including this scholarship for EU students. Also in the pipeline are plans for a China-EU Law School, and the agreement is expected to be signed soon.

 

It is estimated that over 30 million people around the world are now learning Chinese as a second language, and Chinese language courses are available in more than 2,500 universities in over 100 countries and regions. Several countries, including the UK, Thailand and Indonesia, have included Chinese courses in their curricula. In South Korea and Japan, some 1 million people are learning Chinese, and the numbers in Latin America, the Middle East and Africa are also growing. It is predicted that the total number of people around the world learning Chinese will reach 100 million by 2010, and at least 4 million Chinese language teachers will be needed then.

 

(China.org.cn by Xu Lin, September 14, 2006)