On March 22 through March 23, the first working conference held by the Breeding Bases for Regional and National Studies of the Ministry of Education was held in Zhejiang Normal University. Relevant leaders from Ministry of Education, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Commerce and Education Office of Zhejiang Province as well as some 200 people from 52 colleges and universities from all over China attended this conference.

Vice President Jin Li, head of Scientific Research Office Zhang Zhaoyi and head of the four research centers that were first included in the Ministry of Education’s Breeding Bases for Regional and National Studies of Beijing Foreign Studies University as well as specialists and scholars from outside the campus attended the conference. Doctor Wang Zhanpeng of British Studies and Doctor Feng Zhongping , head of the Institute of European Studies of China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations participated in the discussion.

In his talk, Hao Ping, vice-minister of the Ministry of Education, gave an objective analysis of the social background, opportunities and challenges in the strengthening of regional and national studies and proposed suggestions for furthering the efforts to enhance regional and national studies.

In the group discussion, Vice-president Jin Li pointed out that strengthening regional and national studies was a key task in developing philosophy and social science in institutions of higher learning and Beijing Foreign Studies University highly valued this task. She also promised that BFSU would follow the instructions of the Ministry of Education and enhance the efforts to improve the quality of research of the regional and national studies centers and implement the “Going Global” policy of the country by solid actions.