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Awards ceremony of 2nd BRI video contest held in Wuhan


Bangladeshpost
Published : 21 Nov 2020 09:26 PM

Amid much festivity and fanfare, the awards ceremony of the Second Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) Short Video Competition was held in Wuhan, central China's Hubei province on Friday. 

The ceremony was co-hosted by China Public Diplomacy Association, the News Center of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council (SASAC) and Global Times Online (www.huanqiu.com).

Wu Hailong, president of China Public Diplomacy Association, Zhang Yihao, deputy director of the SASAC News Center, Rong Hanjun, first-level inspector of the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Hubei Provincial Committee, Xie Rongbin, deputy editor-in-chief of Global Times and also member of the board of directors of People’s Daily Online and member of the board of directors of Global Times Online, and Huang Zhijin, deputy secretary of CPC China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group Co., Ltd. committee spoke at the event.

The competition has drawn extensive attention since its launching in July, said Wu. It was actively joined by Chinese enterprises and their employees in Belt and Road countries, who used their cameras to unfold the touching stories of beating COVID-19 together with local people and joining hands with them to share weal and woe, he noted, adding that the videos demonstrated the characters of the employees of the Chinese enterprises in the Belt and Road countries.

 “The short video competition was a concrete action of telling Chinese stories, an example of people-to-people exchanges between China and foreign countries, and also a lively public diplomatic activity,” Wu remarked.

"I'm glad to see, through the more than 500 entries of the competition, that great stories are happening every day about the Belt and Road construction," said Zhang, adding that he also saw in the videos the resolution and confidence of the people of the whole world to jointly fight the virus and resume production.

He said mutual assistance has always been highlighted in the Chinese culture. In the face of the sudden COVID-19 outbreak, China tried its best to help with the global fight against the virus, passing on the spirit of cooperation, and it also actively assisted global poverty reduction and promoted sustainable development, making concrete actions to implement the BRI vision of building a community with a shared future for mankind, he noted.

Rong said that collecting great stories about how the BRI contributes to the building of a community with a shared future for mankind from Belt and Road constructors and people from the Belt and Road countries, and telling these stories in a way that makes foreign audience feel comfortable accepting, the competition has achieved wide and positive influence both at home and abroad.

He called the second BRI Short Video Competition a hard-won result given the COVID-19 pandemic this year. The award ceremony, held in the heroic city of Wuhan to witness the great stories of the Belt and Road cooperation, bore special significance, he remarked.

Xie said at the ceremony that Global Times and Global Times Online, as media outlets with both domestic and international influence, have always taken the BRI as a vital topic in their reports over the recent years.

Citing his own experiences of being a journalist in Yugoslavia from 1999 to 2002, during which he personally witnessed the painstaking efforts made by the then-fledgling Chinese enterprises to expand overseas businesses, he said he was delighted to see the growth of these enterprises today when he visited Belt and Road countries for interviews again, though the growth was arduous. 

He said the competition was a bold attempt of the Global Times Online to tell Chinese stories and build a bridge of international economic and cultural exchanges as a media outlet. "Facts proved that our decision is 100% correct," he said.

Huang compared the BRI Short Video Competition to a “bridge” connecting people and enhancing their friendship, saying China is willing to join hands with and offer mutual assistance to Belt and Road countries and regions to build a bridge of common development in the year of 2020 haunted by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

He emphasized the country will keep enhancing its global competitiveness. On one hand, the "going global" strategy of Chinese enterprises will be accelerated to expand international operation, improve core competitiveness and enhance the hard power of enterprises; on the other hand, efforts will also be made by Chinese enterprises to build brands, shape cultures and display images, so as to improve their soft power and capability of overseas communication, and contribute to the BRI construction, he explained.

Besides, diplomats from foreign embassies in China, representatives of China’s award-winning central enterprises and foreign journalists also participated in the program. 

Under the theme of “Act in Solidarity” and extending the planning of the first session, the second BRI Short Video Competition kept focusing on the BRI and contributed to the building of a community with a shared future for mankind by soliciting short videos of Belt and Road stories from Belt and Road constructors and beneficiaries.

Lasting from mid-July to late September, the competition received active responses from enterprises, public institutions and individuals from different sectors. A total of more than 500 entries were collected from nearly 80 countries. 

Based on the Organizing Committee's preliminary review, public voting and expert evaluation, the ten final award winners of this competition are as follows: Cultural Communication Ambassador Award (5 winners), Originality Award (5 winners), Outstanding Editing Award (5 winners), Outstanding Contribution Award (5 winners), Popularity Award (5 winners), Epidemic-Combating Award (5 winners), Overseas Popularity Award (5 winners), The Most Beautiful BRI Co-builders Award (10 winners), Excellent Works Award (20 winners), and Outstanding Organizer Award (2 winners). The awards have been granted to a total of 65 award-winning entries and 2 organizer units.

According to statistics, the entries have received more than 300 million views, including nearly 50 million from overseas, telling the colorful stories about the Belt and Road to global audience. 

The entries were not only displayed on the exclusive voting platform Kuaishou under the hashtag of “#Footprints and Memories#”, but also published on Douyin, Bilibili, and Tencent Video, as well as overseas social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Tik Tok.