Youths around world connect on trade issues at conference

The World Jiangmen Youth Conference held on Oct 15 in Jiangmen city, Guangdong province, provided an innovative platform for overseas Chinese and young people around the world to communicate, cooperate and seek mutual economic development, said local officials.

For the first time, the event adopted an online and offline model with live broadcasts to create a "grand meeting for world youths that never ends", according to the organizing committee.

Pang Guomei, director of the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the People's Government of Guangdong Province, said that the event was an innovative attempt in a new era.

"I hope that overseas Chinese can seize the historical opportunities under the development plans, such as the Belt and Road Initiative, the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and Shenzhen's construction of a pioneering demonstration zone for socialism with Chinese characteristics to boost the prosperity of the motherland and help Guangdong's high-quality development," Peng said.

The World Jiangmen Youth Conference is held every two years and is organized by associations or liaison branches of Jiangmen in countries and regions around the world. Since 2008, the event has been held in Jiangmen, Macao, Sabah, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Indonesia and Los Angeles.

Over the years, the scale and influence of the event have gradually increased.

Each year, the conference has attracted more than 1,000 young talented people from more than 30 countries or regions around the world.

Taking Jiangmen as the starting point and "nostalgia" and "win-win" as the main focus, the conference connects diverse young people to create a united and pioneering force for Jiangmen, China and the world.

Located in the western part of the Pearl River Delta, Jiangmen is an important city in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. It has a total area of 9,507 square kilometers and a population of 4.63 million.

Jiangmen is renowned as "China's No 1 hometown of overseas Chinese". There are more than 4 million people with ancestral roots in Jiangmen who now live in 107 countries and regions around the world.

Liu Yi, mayor of Jiangmen, said that in the past 12 years, the World Jiangmen Youth Conference has united youths in China and abroad to work together; promoted the friendship and exchanges of youth associations; and provided an important channel for the world to hear the voices of a new generation of overseas Chinese.

"Through the platform of the World Jiangmen Youth Conference, we also introduced the good investment environment of Jiangmen to the world, expanded multi-field communication between Jiangmen and countries and regions from all over the world, and allowed overseas Chinese to know a new face of Jiangmen. At present, we have established 26 overseas Jiangmen youth federations in 21 countries and regions, and established a global youth network for Jiangmen's external contacts.

"To fight COVID-19 earlier this year, 26 overseas Jiangmen youth federations donated materials and medicines to support the motherland," Liu said.

This year's Jiangmen World Youth Conference innovated its model to enhance economic exchanges via three forms; cloud meeting, cloud business opportunity and cloud dialogue.

In the cloud meeting session, the conference introduced the Notice on Recognizing Overseas Organizations' and Individuals' Outstanding Performance in Jiangmen's Fight Against the COVID-19 Epidemic. Jiangmen and overseas teenagers also chanted to each other through cloud technology to expressing high spirits, promoting Chinese culture and spreading the good word of China.

Liang Yibing and Liang Hong, descendants of Liang Qichao, the country's renowned reformer and educator in last century, had a cordial exchange with the teenagers.

The two were hired as honorary consultants for the Young China Talk, a cultural exchange program for overseas Chinese youths.

In the cloud business opportunity session, Jiangmen introduced a series of platforms including Guangdong (Jiangmen) Panama trade docking, Jiangmen Daguang Bay bonded logistics center and the Qiaozhihui online platform to connect foreign trade companies to share and explore the overseas market.

In the cloud dialogue session, local officials of the Jiangmen overseas Chinese affairs bureau, the bureau of commerce, the federation of overseas Chinese, as well as professionals such as Chinese medicine and respiratory tract experts communicated with overseas youths on issues, such as economic and trade docking and epidemic prevention.