On February 8, 2023, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) 10th Anniversary Seminar and Assessment of Progress and Lecture Series Launching Ceremony was successfully held. The meeting was co-hosted by Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China (RDCY) and Silk Road School of Renmin University of China. More than 10 renowned experts from the National Development and Reform Commission, Yiwu Municipal Government and other government departments, as well as the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Tsinghua University and Peking University were invited to discuss the development process of the 10th anniversary of BRI. The research report of Restarting BRI Research, Reshaping the Global Thought Value Chain - Overview of BRI 10th Anniversary Research and Future Prospects was released. The seminar also held the launching ceremony of the global lecture series on the 10th anniversary of BRI. More than 100,000 people watched the seminar online. The conference was reported by Xinhua News Agency, People's Daily, Economic Daily, Global Times, China Youth Daily, Beijing Daily, Southern Metropolis Daily, China Trade Daily, International Business Daily, China News, China Review, China.com, Belt and Road Outlook, Shenzhen TV, Sansha TV, Hubei TV, Phoenix TV, and Phoenix.com.

At the opening ceremony, Prof. Wang Yi, Vice President of Renmin University of China, and Zhai Dongsheng, Director of BRI Center under the National Development and Reform Commission of China, delivered speeches.

Wang Yi said that the seminar and lecture series on "BRI Progress and Evaluation into the 10th Anniversary" co-organized by RDCY and the Silk Roads School of Renmin University of China is very timely. He stressed that BRI has experienced ten years of continuous development in the context of the "world view" that the Chinese nation has always upheld, and is a road of solidarity for common development, a road of interconnection and win-win, a road of growth in trade and investment, a road of hope for mutual help, and a road of hope. Currently, we are at an important point in time in the ten years of BRI. Looking ahead to the next decade, as key regions and projects enter the harvesting and deepening period, BRI will continue to promote a new model of international cooperation and inject certainty of peace and development into the international community.

Wang Yi, Vice President of Renmin University of China

According to Zhai Dongsheng, the ten-year plan to build BRI together has achieved very brilliant progress and results. He stressed that BRI has a guarantee of theories, mechanism and capacity building, which is not available in other international initiatives benchmarked against BRI. At present, the international situation is complex, and unpredictable. The world's unprecedented changes are actually becoming "chaos", so the next decade of BRI will still be a mix of opportunities and risks. He said that in the future, it will need to expand into new areas while maintaining a solid foundation, and that China needs to continue to add new energy and momentum to the joint construction, and to more steadily coordinate the relationship between construction and security, as well as to create a more harmonious international public opinion atmosphere for the joint construction.

Zhai Dongsheng, director of BRI Center under the National Development and Reform Commission of China

Wang Wei, Vice Mayor of Yiwu City at Zhejiang province, said that Yiwu is an international city built on top of the market and connected to overseas, with the characteristics of international integration. In the past ten years, Yiwu has made rapid development by taking advantage of BRI. He focused on the China-Europe Railway Express Yiwu-Madrid line in the last year to send the number of boxes and the number of trains to achieve a "double overtaking". BRI also pushed Yiwu and Ningbo Zhoushan Port to achieve integration, a customs declaration, an inspection, a release, two customs as a customs, two ports as a port and several other achievements. He said that in the BRI on the occasion of the tenth anniversary, Yiwu future is willing to continue to do a good job to boost policy coordination, facility connectivity, unimpeded trade, financial integration and people-to-people bonds.

Wang Wei, Vice Mayor of Yiwu City

Afterwards, the launching ceremony of the 10th anniversary global lecture series of BRI was successfully held. Wang Yi, Vice President of Renmin University of China, Zhai Dongsheng, director of BRI Center under the National Development and Reform Commission of China, Wang Wei, Vice Mayor of Yiwu, and Wang Wen, Executive Dean of RDCY and the Deputy Dean of Silk Road School at Renmin University of China, jointly inaugurated the global lecture series, which aims to tell the world about the progress of BRI, inviting a number of well-known experts at home and abroad to participate. It is reported that the lecture series is currently set up for twelve lectures and will be continuously updated to warm up for the upcoming third Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation this year.

BRI 10th Anniversary Global Lecture Series Launching Ceremony

In the report release session, Wang Wen released Restarting BRI Research, Reshaping the Global Thought Value Chain - Overview of BRI 10th Anniversary Research and Future Prospects. The report is based on an academic paper in the core journal Frontline (Qian Xian), which originally coined a new term "global thought value chain" and used detailed data to analyze the impact of the pandemic and other factors that have turned BRI research cold. The report finds that the reshaping of the global value chain of ideas faces serious challenges. It is necessary to further increase the efforts of BRI research, attach great importance to both "quantity" and "quality", accelerate the process of reshaping the global ideological value chain, form a soft power commensurate with national power, and help the Chinese nation to develop a soft power. In this regard, the report makes three recommendations: first, insist on strategic firmness and strategic flexibility; second, insist on the combination of persistent and cooperative research; third, insist on the combination of innovative research and dissemination research.

Wang Wen, Executive Dean of RDCY and Deputy Dean of Silk Road School at Renmin University of China