Confucius Institutes across Africa convene in Nairobi for annual summit

Kenya is hosting this year's annual summit of Confucius Institutes.

The summit which brings together more than 67 institutes and classrooms from across Africa is being held from May 29 to June 1.

The 2024 joint conference of Confucius Institutes in Africa seeks to promote exchange and cooperation between Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms in the continent.

The event is organised by the University of Nairobi, the Chinese International Education Foundation and the Confucius Institute of the University of Nairobi headed by Prof Wang Shangxue.  

Organisers said the forum will discuss how to strengthen collaboration and the brand of Confucius Institutes.

The sessions will also delve into how to promote the quality and systematic development of Confucius Institutes in Africa. 

More than 100 representatives from various Confucius Institutes and independent Confucius Classrooms in Africa are attending the conference.

Parliamentary Affairs PS Aurelia Rono, who represented Education Cabinet Secretary Ezekiel Machogu at the forum on Thursday, reaffirmed Kenya's commitment to the collaboration between her and China under the Confucius Institutes framework.

She said the country was elated that China chose Nairobi to house the summit this year, underscoring it's place in bolstering the vision of the two countries to up exchanges between it's people.

PS Rono said the government was committed to working with China on academic exchanges.

The PS hailed China's contribution to the country's education sector, citing the more than 20,000 scholarships Kenyans have accessed through the Confucius Institutes.

PS Rono said Kenya would also put mechanisms for language exchanges through which Chinese nationals would be taught Kiswahili.

The theme of the joint conference which coincides with the 20th anniversary of the establishment of Confucius Institutes in Africa is "Promoting Localization, Development, Collaboration and Innovation of African Confucius Institutes." 

Representatives from the China International Language Centre, Confucius Institutes in Sychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Senegal, Chad, Ghana, Gambia, Morocco, Equitorial Guinea, Burundi, Mauritius and other African countries are attending the fete. 

International Society for Chinese Language Teaching Chairperson Prof Zhong Yinghua said though a lot of progress has been made in teaching the language in Africa, more still needs to be done. 

He said there is need to integrate Chinese language courses into basic education laying the foundation of Chinese language teaching and learning. 

"We also need to strengthen Chinese language teachers' training programs to address the shortage of high-level local teaching staff," Yinghua said. 

Yinghua added that there is also need to enhance targeted professional training for local teachers so as to improve their teaching effectiveness. 

It is noteworthy that Kiswahili is also taught in China. 

UoN Vice Chancellor Prof Stephen Kiama noted that the UoN Confucius Institute was started in 2005 in partnership with Tianjin Normal University in China. 

"We are the first in Africa to bring the Bachelor of Arts in Chinese in 2009 and Bachelor of Education Arts Chinese program in 2023," he said. 

Kiama said UoN has been at the forefront of promoting Chinese language in Kenya.