Young Chinese achieve their potential through entrepreneurship

HEFEI, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- Many young Chinese have showcased their innovative business ideas during the ongoing national mass entrepreneurship and innovation week, which kicked off Thursday in Hefei, capital of east China's Anhui Province.

Themed "Innovation drives vitality, entrepreneurship creates employment," the event will continue until Sept. 21.

From creative cultural products and novel mushroom growing techniques to aerial imaging technology, over 160 typical projects selected from around the nation are showcased in Hefei, the main venue of this year's event.

To promote tourism and culture of Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes, a UNESCO World Heritage site in northwest China's Gansu Province, a creative cultural product project was set up at Lanzhou Jiaotong University in 2015.

"So far, we have launched eight types of creative cultural products, including colored sand craft plates, moon-shaped fans and seals, all of which feature patterns of the signature Flying Apsaras of the grottoes," said Liang Yan, associate professor at the university's art and design school.

About 80 students are enrolled in the project every year. Apart from learning art and design skills, they also have to take courses on intellectual property protection, patent application and entrepreneurship policies that may come in handy when they start a business in the future.

Hao Kaili, a postgraduate student majoring in environmental design, has been involved with the project for about three years. She hails from Gansu and feels proud every time she completes a creative work with the distinctive features of Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes.

"Among all the students who have participated in this project, about 50 have pursued careers in entrepreneurship after their graduation," said Liang, adding that there are 48 such creative projects in the university, covering various majors, that allow students to experience entrepreneurship at an early stage.

Entrepreneurship helps create employment. It is estimated that about 900,000 college students started their own businesses in 2021, while the number was only 478,000 in 2014, according to a report released by Tianming Shuangchuang research institute.

Min Qifeng, a 21-year-old postgraduate student from China Three Gorges University, has also jumped on the entrepreneurship bandwagon starting in 2018.

Min and his five classmates established a biotechnology company that specializes in fungiculture with the help of his college professors.

"At present, there are 27 people in our company, all of whom are from the university. Our products such as mushroom, bamboo fungus and black fungus are sold to school canteens and restaurants in Yichang City in central China's Hubei Province, where the school is based," said Min, who is also the general manager of the company.

Under the promotion of the company, 12 different types of fungi have been cultivated in a total area of about 3,000 mu (200 hectares) across the country, helping create over 1,000 job opportunities. The company's annual output value has now exceeded 62,000 yuan (about 8,946 U.S. dollars) per mu, helping 242 people from 72 households shake off poverty.

"Promoting mass entrepreneurship and innovation has become an important measure to implement the innovation-driven development strategy over the recent years, and the practice has continued to expand," said Zhang Guihua, who works with the China Association for Science and Technology.

The annual national mass entrepreneurship and innovation week is expected to see the launch of nearly 1,000 activities across the country, both online and offline.