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December 13, 2018

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Celebrating 40 years with international trade

Reunions of middle-aged Chinese often surprise the younger generation for the level of excitement and involvement. Never more so than the two dozen who gathered at the Bund to commemorate 40 years since they became the first students of international trade and business in China in 1978.

The unique bunch, in their 50s and 60s, all fluent in English and well-traveled, flew in from all around the world to Shanghai, where most of them worked, to join those still living in the city for a long-awaited reunion, and also to celebrate the 40th anniversary of China’s reform and opening-up.

“The policy led directly to the restart of the international trade major after the ‘cultural revolution’ (1966-76), when the country was hungry for international trade professionals,” said Lin Guijun, one of the youngest in the class 40 years ago who stayed on at their alma mater in Beijing, the University of International Business and Economics, and later became its vice president.

“Every one of our class had fate tied so closely to the country’s history of international trade from the very beginning,” he added.

China’s international trade has come a long way, as the numbers prove. According to statistics from Shanghai Commission of Economy and Information, Chinese trade totaled US$4 trillion in 2017, 782 times of that volume in 1978.

Lin and his former classmates have both contributed to and benefited from this long process and now feel the need to reflect upon their experiences, both the successes and failures.

In 1978, when they attended the national college entrance examination after it was revived, few were fresh high school graduates due to the “cultural revolution.” They were either working at factories, in remote villages, or just staying at home.

Today, some have retired from executive positions in state-owned enterprises, multinational companies, government posts and professorships while others remain in a world of international trade that is completely different from the one when they started.

“In the narrow definition, trade is just buying and selling goods, but in a broader way that fits better with the global business today, it is much more sophisticated and interwoven,” said Cui Yue, who travels frequently between California in the United States and China’s Yangtze River Delta region for business.

“My own career sort of resembles that. From helping importing and exporting goods at the beginning to a more complicated business today,” Cui said.

In the 1980s and 1990s, before many large multinationals set up an office on China’s mainland, Cui helped connect domestic buyers and foreign sellers, when sales to China took a small percentage of their business.

“Those were the good old times, when it grew so quickly from so little and people like me could find so many opportunities,” Cui recalled.

It was the time when his alma mater was among the most popular schools for high school students, since it linked more closely to working in trade after graduation, meaning a decent salary and career at the time.

Today, many multinationals have their Asia headquarters in China, while e-commerce platforms such as Alibaba make it much easier for small businesses to find each other.

But Cui has gone into a special sector that requires expertise. He mainly helps small- to medium-sized foreign machinery companies find multiple, in many cases hundreds of, suppliers and have their prototypes made in China.

“There are thousands of small factories spanning the Yangtze River Delta region, which makes it much easier to find suppliers for all parts needed for one sophisticated machine, and have it made at the same international standard but much cheaper than in the United States,” Cui said. “Many small Chinese factories aren’t even aware that they can make international-standard parts with a little more effort, and part of my job and expertise is to train them to do exactly that. It’s quite a fun experience.”

Cui is not so worried about the ongoing trade skirmish since “there is demand, and you can find cheaper supplies here, and that’s the simple rule of trade.”

His former classmate Huang Junqiang took a very different path, spending his entire career at state-owned China Resources while the company transformed from the country’s major trade agency to a conglomerate spanning a variety of businesses.

“You youngsters probably have no idea what telex is, but it was a necessity when we dealt with international trade. We had all these codes mixing Cantonese and English phrases that bewildered both Chinese and foreigners. What a strange and fun time!” Huang said, recalling his time in Hong Kong. “The company was undergoing a major change when we started, a result of the country’s structural reform of foreign trade. It provided us youngsters with not only opportunities, but also unprecedented challenges. Nobody knew what the correct answer was or if there was one.”

The company, founded in 1938 under a different name, represented a third of the country’s total foreign trade volume at its highest. In 1983, it was incorporated into a more diverse group spanning various industries, as a result of structural reform in the country’s international trade sector.

“When I look at the young people working there today, I’m quite glad that they are so much more knowledgeable and capable than we were when we started,” he said.

His former classmate Lin feels the same for the students in international trade and those who have just started in the business today.

“They speak more and better languages, and they are also more innovative to find new markets, as the country’s Belt and Road Initiative encourages and provides them with more fresh markets to explore and dig further,” Lin said.

One of the few women in the class, Zhang Liqing was assigned to helping the import and export of cultural performances after graduation, from taking traditional opera and circus shows abroad in the early years to inviting foreign officials and celebrities to modern performances in China in recent times.

“When I started traveling in the 1980s, it was rare and we knew nothing about these nations, and it’s quite amazing to see that kind of foreign travel getting increasingly more common among Chinese people,” she said.

Zhang has also found today’s foreign audiences more knowledgeable about Chinese arts and culture, while it was a complete exotic myth in the 1980s. She particularly recommends the modern dance performances at Shanghai International Dance Center, where one can get a taste of the modern dance scene in China.

“None of us would be who we are today without the reform and opening-up policy,” said Jean Liu, chief corporate affairs officer of EF China and one of the initiators of the reunion. “That’s why we celebrate both the reunion and opening-up policy, and in Shanghai.”




 

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