Be Mindful of National Strategy of Silk Road Development -- Analysis of "Polar Silk Road" from SIS Researcher Yan Yu
On the afternoon of May 24th, 2018, Yan Yu, a full-time researcher at the School of International Studies (SIS), gave a special lecture on "Polar Silk Road" to SIS students. Researcher Yan has obtained her doctorate at Lomonosov Moscow State University. The lecture took place at No. 1 Teaching Building on South Campus of Sun Yat-sen University.
Yan Yu
The lecture firstly unfolded the development of Silk Road from ancient times to the present day. Through maps, Ms. Yan gave a detailed introduction about the Silk Road in ancient times and the history of Central Asia in terms of natural environments and cultures. Then, she introduced the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-century Maritime Silk Road with vivid graphs that showed the new layout for Chinese economic belt construction. Finally, through explaining geographical knowledge and the latest political situations, Ms. Yan has provided the students with a better description of the development of the Silk Road.
Before introducing the concept "Polar Silk Road", Ms. Yan had asked two questions. How do you connect the Maritime-Continental Silk Roads? And what weaknesses are there in the current layout? Then, both questions had been discussed extensively among the students. In addition to explaining the "Polar Silk Road" with maps and time divisions, she also told some interesting stories about five Nordic countries. By comparing transportation costs and efficiency of northwest, central, northeast, and regular shipping routes, Ms. Yan explained complicated questions with simple geographical knowledge and common sense, deepening the students' understanding of Arctic shipping routes.
Students listening to Ms. Yan
Then, Ms. Yan sorted out four major advantages of the Polar Silk Road development, i.e. reducing costs, importing energy, bringing transformation and revitalizing the old industrial bases in Northeast China. Besides, she also pointed out some difficulties in developing Polar Silk Road, such as inadequate safety of navigation, lack of experienced seamen, imperfect infrastructure construction, complex geopolitical issues, harsh environments, and lack of industrial norms.
As for the Sino-Russian cooperation in initiating the Polar Silk Road, Ms. Yan briefly introduced the backgrounds of bilateral cooperation and analyzed China's and Russia's roles in the international community. She noted that although there are geopolitical challenges, the potential for Sino-Russian economic and trade cooperation is undoubtedly huge.
From Ms. Yan's in-depth and interesting introduction, the students had a better understanding of "Polar Silk Road" and Sino-Russian cooperation.
Translated by Tian Ying
Proofread by Zhou Zhanhong, Peng An
