The announcement was made by Chinese personnel officials and representatives from multinational corporations and well-known universities at a press conference held in Beijing.

The programme, initiated by the Chinese Government with 11 APEC members as co-sponsors, and viewed as a "substantive contribution to APEC by China," aims at promoting human capacity building and strengthening economic and technological co-operations in the Asia-Pacific region in the new century.

To narrow the digital divide among APEC's 21 members, the programme plans to offer free online training to 1,500 senior IT professionals for its member economies, particularly developing ones, in the next three years.

Meanwhile, the programme is expected to build a virtual classroom to support e-learning for the masses, and a cyber forum to encourage involvement of all stakeholders in APEC economies.

"Every preparation, headed by the Ministry of Personnel (MOP) as a major part of the programme, has ensured the training plan will be put into practice," MOP's Vice-Minister Hou Jianliang confirmed.

The APEC human capacity building platform and the portal website (www.apechcb.org.cn) have been developed and opened by China with the support of Tsinghua Tongfang Co Ltd and China Training Network.

The four most authoritative training courses for internationally recognized professional certifications in the IT area today have been selected for the 1,500 IT professionals, with computer and online facilities reaching their designed position.

To date, training and certifications on CCNA, CCNP, SCJP and OCP have been provided by well-known IT corporations, including Cisco Certified Network Associate, Cisco Certified Network Professional, SUN Certified Java Programmer and Oracle Certificate Professional.

Technological support for the programme by education/training institutions, including Tsinghua University, University of South California, Kyoto University and China Training Network, has also taken place.

(China Daily November 2, 2001)