China and UNESCO: advance hand in hand
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E-mail China Today, October 8, 2015
IN October 1971, four days after China was formally readmitted to the UN, UNESCO decided to restore China's legitimate seat, thus becoming the first UN specialized agency to do so.
UNESCO was established in November 1946. China was one of its founding members and also one of the 14 countries to sign an agreement on the establishment of such an organization. In 1972, China attended the 17th General Conference of UNESCO in Paris. However, until the first half of 1978, China's cooperation with UNESCO was zero.
In July 1978, Amadou Mahtar M'Bow, then director general of UNESCO, visited China. His meeting with Deng Xiaoping completely changed the situation. Upon completion of his visit, M'Bow signed the Memorandum on Meetings between the UNESCO Director General and the Minister of Education, Vice Minister of Culture, and Deputy Secretary-General of the Chinese Academy of Sciences of the People's Republic of China. This marked the starting point of cooperation between China and UNESCO. From the second half of 1978 to the end of the 1980s, the two sides annually cooperated on 300 programs.
In February 1979, Deng Xiaoping approved the establishment of the Chinese National Commission for UNESCO. Under its coordination, cooperation between China and UNESCO moved into the fast lane. Today, China's role in UNESCO has transformed from learner to active participant.
Cooperation in Education
As the world's most populous developing country, China has benefited greatly from its cooperation with UNESCO in the field of education. Initially, China was in need of financial assistance. In the 1980s, two UNESCO programs provided grants to more than 1,000 Chinese experts and scholars to participate in more than 120 education schemes, among which 95 were professional conferences and inspection trips to foreign countries.
UNESCO offers a great deal to its member states in terms of intellectual support and cooperation platforms. Since 1978, China has dispatched delegations led by the Vice Minister of Education or high-ranking cadres to the 37th to 45th International Conferences on Education. Chinese delegates have participated in dialogues on science and technology education, middle school education, education for all, development of education and culture, and teacher training.
In May 2015, UNESCO's International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) was convened in Qingdao, China. Focusing on ICT and education post-2015, participants at the conference sought to create an interface between education and ICT sectors to promote wider and deeper application of ICT in education, thus better promoting the implementation of the world's post-2015 agenda in education.
China is also a beneficiary of UNESCO's Education for All (EFA) movement. On September 7, 1984, Bazhong County of Sichuan Province received UNESCO's Noma Literacy Prize for its outstanding performance in eliminating illiteracy. Another four regions and organizations in China have since been awarded International Literacy Awards.
The Education for All movement launched by UNESCO in 1990 aims to popularize primary education, eradicate adult illiteracy and promote continuing education for adults. At that time, China was the most populous country with the highest absolute number of illiterates in the world, its adult illiteracy rate hitting 15.88 percent. China has been an active player in the Education for All movement from the very beginning. It signed the declaration at the Education for All Summit of the Nine High-Population Countries held in New Delhi in December 1993, and issued China's Education for All Action Agenda in 1993. Today, the enrollment rate of children to primary and middle school in China is close to 100 percent. A report released by UNESCO in January 2014 showed that China performs excellently in increasing literacy; there has been an overall decline of 130 million adult illiterates in China over the past 20 years, reflecting a 70 percent decrease.
UNESCO's international literacy prizes include the Confucius Prize for Literacy funded by China and the King Sejong Literacy Prize funded by South Korea. The Confucius Prize for Literacy was established in 2005 and recognizes activities serving rural adults and out-of-school children.
In October 1993, at UNESCO's 27th General Conference, the 184 member states reached consensus to approve the Chinese government's proposal to establish the International Research and Training Center for Rural Education in China. As the only research institution of UNESCO operating in a developing country, it has laid foundations for the transformation of China's role in the global education sphere from "taking" to "giving." Nicholas Burnett, then assistant director-general for Education at UNESCO, said that China was starting to provide more assistance to international society, and that he believed it was vitally important to encourage international society to share China's experiences.
Sci & Tech Exchange
China and UNESCO have seen smooth cooperation in science and technology since their very first collaborative project. From 1975 to 1983, the Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (ISTIC) sent talents to study at UNESCO and invited foreign experts to give lectures in China, cultivating over 200 ICT specialists.
Cooperation between China and UNESCO covers a wide range, including physics, chemistry, information, automation, environment, biology, marine science, hydrogeology, and computer science. UNESCO allows China access to numerous programs, such as the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, International Hydrological Program, Man and Biosphere Program, International Geological Correlation Program, General Information Program, and Intergovernmental Informatics Program. The projects and discussions in those areas have proved helpful, not only in promoting the development of science and technology, environmental protection, and information development in China, but also in providing opportunities for China to make its contribution to international sci & tech cooperation.
A number of China's scientists have won UNESCO awards over the years. From 1987 to 1995, China, via a Germany-based trust fund, launched a large-scale China-Germany research program on ecology, covering forests, water, and urban ecological systems, and achieved great success. Yuan Longping, Chinese scientist of hybrid rice, and Wang Xuan, professor at Peking University, won the UNESCO Science Prize in 1987 and 1995, respectively. Chen Zhangliang, professor at Peking University, and Chen Yongchuan, professor at Nankai University, were awarded the UNESCO Javed Husain Prize for Young Scientists in 1991 and 1997, respectively.
Cultural Heritage Preservation
On August 31, 2015, UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova visited Shaanxi Province in China and conferred on it certification for the Silk Road to be inscribed on the World Heritage List. The inscription was co-submitted by China, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan. During the trip she also visited world cultural heritage sites in the province such as the terracotta warriors. At the museum of this terracotta army from 2,300 years ago, Irina Bokova wrote in the guestbook that UNESCO was proud to work with Chinese experts to protect the site together.
As a country with an ancient civilization and long history, China has 38 world intangible cultural heritage sites and 48 world cultural and natural heritage sites, among which 30 are cultural heritage, 10 are natural heritage, four are of cultural and natural mixed properties and four are cultural landscapes.
China ratified the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World's Cultural and Natural Heritage in 1985. In 1987, the first batch of cultural sites in the country, including the Peking Man Site at Zhoukoudian, the Mogao Grottoes, Mount Tai, the Great Wall, and the Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor, were listed as World Heritage sites. Since then more Chinese cultural sites have made the list. As part of its assessment process, UNESCO dispatched experts to China to provide training and guidance on how to better protect those cultural and natural heritage sites.
In 2004, the 28th Session of the World Heritage Committee was convened in Suzhou City in China, gaining national and worldwide attention. Many of China's achievements, such as issuing relevant laws and regulations on protecting world heritage, are recognized by international society and the World Heritage Committee. In 2003, the Guang Yu Ancestral Hall in Qiangang Village of Cong-hua City in Guangdong Province was given an award for excellent protection of the site. In 2012, Zhang Xinsheng, then chairman of UNESCO's Executive Board, said that China had made much headway in heritage protection; however, he warned that because China housed so many heritage sites, it was still a tough job to balance the development of the economy and the protection of those sites.
While receiving support from UNESCO, China has also carried out its obligations by sending experts to neighboring countries to provide technical support in the protection of their world heritage sites.
On November 5, 2013, China's Vice Education Minister Hao Ping was elected president of the 37th Session of UNESCO's General Conference. Irina Bokova said during an interview with Oriental Outlook that China had showed great leadership ability and the election of Hao Ping demonstrated UNESCO's recognition of China's influence and leadership power.
China and UNESCO are bound to carry out further cooperation in the future.
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