Luban Workshops witness international cooperation

To strengthen comprehensive strategic and cooperative partnership between China and Africa, China released its plan to launch eight major initiatives in collaboration with African countries during the opening ceremony of the 2018 Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC).

China will share more of its development practices with Africa. Ten Luban Workshops will be set up in Africa to provide vocational training to the African youth, supporting the opening of a China-Africa innovation cooperation center to promote youth innovation and entrepreneurship. Increasing exchanges also include 50,000 Chinese government scholarships and 50,000 training opportunities for seminars and workshops, and 2,000 young Africans visit to China.

The first China-India Vocational Education Cooperation Forum was successfully held in New Delhi, India on Dec 20, 2018, organized by the Tianjin Municipal Education Commission and the Chinese Embassy in India, Tianjin Light Industry Vocational Technical College, Tianjin l Vocational College of Mechanics and Electricity, and Chennai Institute of Technology, India.

China-India Vocational Education Cooperation Forum [Photo provided to exploringtianjin.com]

Lu Jingquan, deputy director of the Tianjin Municipal Education Commission, delivered a keynote speech at the meeting. He confirmed the achievements of Tianjin as a national modern vocational education reform and innovation demonstration zone, emphasized the development history, concept, characteristics and cooperation with India and versioned a mutual-benefit cooperation model with India during his speech.

Lu Jingquan [Photo provided to exploringtianjin.com]

As a national demonstration zone for modern vocational education reform and innovation, Tianjin is piloting China's vocational education model. It shares advanced vocational technology and professional culture with the countries along the Belt and Road Initiative to build a connecting bridge between Tianjin vocational education and outside.

Over 80 representatives from both India and China attended the forum, including Li Baijun, Commercial Counsellor of the Chinese Embassy in India, Ma Jianfei Deputy Director General of the Confucius Institute Headquarters and Deputy Director of the Hanban Office, Ramesh Kanwar, President of the Lavli University of Technology, and Sanjay Tickoo, Vice President of the National Institute of Information Technology (NIIT).

China-India Vocational Education Cooperation Forum [Photo provided to exploringtianjin.com]

Hot discussions and exchanges were made around the school-running model of Luban workshop, the advantages and achievements of China-India vocational education, and the cooperation directions. The forum also held the opening ceremony of the overseas development base of teachers and students of Tianjin Vocational College in China and the Teaching Practice Innovation Project (EPIP). The EPIP Teaching and Research Center of India aims to cultivate students' professional quality, comprehensive practical and innovative ability. The students will learn from practical application of engineering projects, with the aim of training innovation ability, and will jointly transform teaching results with Indian universities.