Incentives to bring brightest home

China will roll out more incentives for overseas Chinese students to return home to start their own businesses and driving innovation, a State Council executive meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang decided yesterday.

Measures will be introduced to simplify the certification requirements and procedures at local levels and to make it easier for overseas Chinese students to obtain hukou, the government system of household registration for residency. Favorable policies concerning the schooling of children of those who return will be implemented without delay, according to a decision taken at the meeting.

Li said many Chinese students now choose to return home for innovation and entrepreneurship each year after completing academic studies overseas. 

“The policy incentives in the pipeline require close inter-agency cooperation and coordination to see concrete results delivered,” the premier said. 

From 1978 to 2017, 83.73 percent of overseas Chinese students, totaling 3.13 million, had come back after completing their studies, according to the Ministry of Education. In 2017 alone, the number of returned students reached 480,900, up by nearly 11.2 percent from 2016.

There are now 351 entrepreneurship parks nationwide, home to more than 23,000 companies and attracting 86,000 Chinese returning from overseas.

According to the decision at the meeting, favorable policies will be adopted to incentivize their entrepreneurship, including intellectual property-backed loans for startup financing, simpler processes for trademark registration, easier application procedures for export qualification, and support for the commercialization of research and development findings. 

“We must facilitate two-way flow of talent to provide strong intellectual support to our country’s development,” Li said.