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China leads the world in many areas, and the meteoric rise of its world-class universities comes in part from engagement with quality universities around the world.

Australia’s Group of Eight (Go8) and China’s nine leading universities (C9) have an agreement under which executives from China and Australia shadow their counterparts.

Professor Wu Zhaohui, Vice President Research from Zhejiang University (ZJU) spent a week last month shadowing Professor Robyn Owens, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) and talking to other academics about potential collaborative projects.

“The Go8-C9 initiative matches the best people from the two groups,” said Eva Chye, UWA’s principal adviser, international relations (north and southeast Asia). “China has been making a big push towards mass higher education. Its publications are now second (in number) to the US. But it’s not about numbers any more, it’s about quality, and China needs to draw on experience from other universities around the world to fine-tune its operations.

“China is becoming a human resource country, with the aim of becoming a human resource powerhouse, and that is driven by its universities,” she said. Professor Owens will shadow Professor Wu at ZJU next year.

“UWA and ZJU have already developed a strong research relationship in a number of areas, including plant sciences, regenerative medicine, and water management, and there are many opportunities to extend this collaboration to other areas,” said Professor Owens.

“ZJU has outstanding research, particularly in engineering and computer science with great industry links, and both universities could benefit significantly from deeper collaborations. WA offers many opportunities through the minerals and resources sector and the SKA project, and ZJU can provide outstanding talent to help develop new technologies of benefit to both nations.”

UWA has a China Five Year Planning Committee, chaired by Ms Chye. Professor Wu met with this group to discuss research innovations and technology transfers in China.

He also toured the Oceans Institute, visited the Faculty of Engineering, Computer and Mathematics and their Centre for Energy, met with the University secretariat, inspected the Pawsey Centre and talked with Associate Professor Paul Bourke and Professor Jennifer Harrison about high performance computing.

Professor Wu met with staff in Arts (including the Confucius Centre), business studies, agriculture and science (the ARC Centre of Excellence in Plant Energy Biology) as well as accompanying Professor Owens to meetings and discussions.

He joined students and staff from ZJU who are studying or working at UWA for a dim sum lunch in Northbridge.

“It was particularly good for Professor Wu to meet all these people in person, as people in China like face to face interaction,” Ms Chye said. “Here in Australia, we tend to send an email as our first communication, but in China, they reach for the phone or see the person face to face if they can."

Published in UWA News , 17 September 2012