B&R by the Numbers: Talent a core concern of Belt and Road Initiative

Editor’s Note: This is the seventeenth installment of Belt and Road Portal's special series on the Belt and Road Big Data Report 2017.

More than 90 percent of the surveyed media and netizens in China support strengthening talent cultivation regarding the Belt and Road Initiative, according to the Belt and Road Big Data Report 2017 published by the State Information Center.

Talents are the key foundation for the Belt and Road construction. Chinese netizens have attached more attention to talent exchange and cultivation with Russia, Southeast Asian and South Asian countries, while Shanghai, Xinjiang, Beijing, Shaanxi and Fujian receive the most attention in Belt and Road talent cultivation.

Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin have several prestigious universities; Xinjiang is at the forefront of China’s opening up to the West and Central Asia; while other places, such as Shaanxi, Fujian and Chongqing, have already initiated cooperation and exchanges with the countries along the Belt and Road routes on talent issues.

Public opinion suggests that China should learn from India and Singapore in relation to talent cultivation and attracting overseas professionals; China should strengthen talent exchanges with Pakistan and Cambodia, offering training opportunities to people from these countries; and China should strengthen cooperation on talent cultivation with Thailand and Malaysia.

The report finds that talents in the following fields are badly needed in the Belt and Road projects: language, financial management, law, education, finance, cultural industry, civil engineering, tourism management, e-commerce and logistics.

The report suggests that China should have a special plan for talent cultivation, exchanges and cooperation, encourage enterprises, higher education institutions and think tanks to take part in cultivating multi-disciplinary talents, strengthen talent cooperation and exchanges with countries along the Belt and Road routes, make better use of the overseas Chinese, students studying abroad and the Confucius Institutes to attract more talents to take part in the Belt and Road projects, and use big data technology to establish a platform which discloses regularly the Belt and Road projects’ demands for talents, as well as to establish a data base regarding the Belt and Road talents at home and abroad.