2010-06-10 09:17

To Tolkin Yunusov, June is a lucky month. The 27-year-old Uzbek student will graduate as an MBA from a Chinese university in two weeks and then start his doctoral research in product branding. Plus, he just learned that his Chinese wife is pregnant.

Four years ago, as a fresh college graduate, Yunusov left his hometown, Namangan of northeast Uzbekistan, to teach English in China's Shanxi province. Back then all he could say in Chinese was "ting bu dong" - "I don't understand what you're saying."

Four years later, Ding Tianxiang - his family name adopted from his wife's given name, meaning "flying freely in the sky" - drives his scooter with palm-sized Chinese and Uzbek flags floating above the handlebars, to his university in Chaoyang district daily. There, he has studied international marketing and now works as a development coordinator for his MBA program at the University of International Business and Economics (UIBE).

Yunusov is just one of the many Uzbek students who came to China for higher learning. He was one of 582 last year, according to the Chinese Ministry of Education. The number will increase as educational exchanges between both countries become more frequent with closer political and economic ties.

Many colleges in Uzbekistan began Chinese language courses with nearly 2,000 students. The Confucius Institute in Tashkent, which opened in 2004 as a joint program between both sides during President Hu Jintao's visit to Uzbekistan, has become an important vehicle for displaying and promoting Chinese culture.

Yunusov has seen with his own eyes how China has attracted more Uzbeks over the years. When the previous English teacher first enrolled in the UIBE as a postgraduate of international marketing in 2008, the school had only two students from Uzbekistan, including himself. Today the university is home to 10 Uzbek students, most of whom major in business. But the total number of Uzbeks in the capital is much more and still growing, let alone those who have chosen to develop in other cities, such as Lanzhou and Guangzhou, said Yunusov.

"One thing I didn't expect is that quite a number of the Uzbek students here have the ambition to work not simply for a local or home company, but for a multinational corporation. They now understand communication as something much more than a two-way exchange. And these front-runners usually have already had some experience living or studying abroad before coming to China."

A former state of the Soviet Union, Uzbekistan's economy is still fledgling, Tolkin said. "We need foreign investment and, in my view, the SCO has benefited us a lot."

According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Uzbekistan, since the founding of the SCO, which includes China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, a total of 1,273 companies in Uzbekistan have received investment from member countries.

Besides joint ventures, 246 such companies are entirely owned by those foreign investors. On the other hand, 519 Uzbek companies have been allowed to establish representatives in the other five countries.

"Plus with the inter-regional railroads built among the six neighbors, we are now connected in a real sense, physically as well as economically," Yunusov said. "And like they say, if your neighbors are happy, then you will be happy and peaceful too."