Official opening of China Week 2022 - Global challenges can only be solved together

The Chinese violin played by XUE Fengjie at the beginning provided a successful introduction before Prof. Dr. Hou, initiator of China Week and Head of the China Competence Center, welcomed all participants. Contrary to the plan, the opening speech was not given by the President, Prof. Dr. Joachim Schachtner, but by the Vice President for Research, Transfer and Transformation, Prof. Dr. Daniel Goldmann. The opening music at the beginning immediately reminded him of his time in China. In this context, he welcomed the inclusion of Clausthal University of Technology in the Chinese government's scholarship program on Monday in order to further promote cooperation. Because, according to Prof. Goldmann, the challenges of the world can no longer be solved alone and will continue to accompany us in the coming decades.

Former Federal Minister and Co-Chair of the German-Chinese Dialogue Forum, Annette Schavan, also expressed her approval at this point. The world in which we currently live will have to deal with more and more issues that affect us all -
climate, war, hunger and poverty - which will require all our efforts. However, the idea of community must take precedence over competition. At the same time, however, it is important to talk about differences and look for solutions together.

Prof. Dr. Angela Ittel, President of TU Braunschweig, put it even more clearly: "The honeymoon of German-Chinese scientific cooperation" is over, which is why we need to be more honest with each other than ever before and allow equal access to markets. This would also mean that it would no longer be possible to work together in certain areas, while in other areas cooperation would be absolutely essential. However, the aim is always to "find a common language" and "build bridges - not burn bridges".

One successful example of successful bridge-building is the cooperation between Clausthal University of Technology and Zhengzhou University, whose President, Prof. Dr. LI Peng, will be joining us live. The long-standing cooperation is due in particular to the efforts of Prof. Dr. Thomas Hanschke, former President of Clausthal University of Technology and China representative of the Lower Saxony MWK.

According to Mr. CHEN Linhao, Counsellor at the Chinese Embassy for Science and Technology, an event such as China Week is also a "flagship event" in German-Chinese cooperation. At the end of his presentation on "Progress of Science & Technology in China and China-Germany STI Cooperation", he also outlined suggestions for future cooperation, whereby he considers it important to focus on research priorities in terms of global challenges such as climate change, carbon neutrality or health. At the same time, the exchange of young scientists should be promoted more strongly and cooperation in the area of research infrastructure should be expanded.

The last keynote speech of the day will be given by Prof. Dr. Michael Dowling on the topic of "Quantum Business", a field of research in which China is very well positioned. At the end of the opening day, moderator Prof. Dr. Hou invites the keynote speakers and Prof. Dr. CAI Jingmen, President of the Senate of Anhui University, to a panel discussion on the topic of "German-Chinese university cooperation against the background of global challenges and 50 years of relations". Here, too, a unified picture of the participants emerged - cooperation is important and should be expanded and promoted, as the global challenges cannot be overcome by Germany or China alone. According to the participants, the importance of further cooperation to the German government was also demonstrated by Chancellor Olaf Scholz's (criticized) trip to China. With regard to future cooperation, however, it is important to clearly weigh up where the respective boundaries lie, i.e. where cooperation is possible and where a competitive situation arises. "We can't do everything - that's not realistic," concluded Prof. Goldmann at the end. So the message of today is clear - people are definitely more reflective, in some cases more critical, when it comes to cooperation. All of today's speakers were in favour of cooperation, but the majority also emphasized that "there are differences that cannot be minimized".