On May 10th, the Seminar on “The 14th Five-Year Plan and the Youth in China” was held by Renmin University of China. JIN Nuo, Chairwoman of the RUC Council, Kevin Rudd, president and CEO of Asia Society and former Prime Minister of Australia, Danilo Türk, President of World Leadership Alliance and former President of Slovenia, and ZHANG Yanling, Senior Research Fellow of RUC Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies and former Vice President of Bank of China, attended the event.

In her speech, Prof. JIN Nuo focused on the growth of youth along with the 14th Five-Year Plan in China. She heighted the importance of ideological leadership, career value, organizing skills, sense of service and global competence of the younger generation.

Prof. WANG Wen, Executive Dean of Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies, issued a report on the characteristics of the “post-90s” generation with specific suggestions for China’s future reform.

In her keynote speech, Ms. ZHANG Yanling said that young population is the soft power of a country. She encouraged policies supporting innovative talents, high-quality education systems, caring social environment for vulnerable teenagers, and policies supporting the flow of talented workers.

Mr. Rudd and Dr. Türk had in-depth conversations with nine student representatives. They exchanged views on topics of a shared human community, sino-foreign relations, globalization and anti-globalization, the role of international organizations, and contemporary global epidemic control and economic recovery.

In the dialogue, Mr. Rudd shared his journey of growing up with his new book “Fearless: The Autobiography of Kevin Rudd.” He hoped to encourage the younger generation to use their precious time at university to think about the most fundamental life issues, and to establish their own beliefs and values to plan their life direction.

Dr. Türk said in the dialogue that the “post-1990 generation” will be a major force for future development of China and the world. He believed that the younger generation should follow the trend of the time and create their own era of globalization. He mentioned that the “one belt and one road” initiative is conducive to world development, and that the world should open to new forms of international organizations and coordinate cooperation.

Nearly 100 RUC students participated the seminar. The seminar was also broadcast live online with more than 1 million auditing audiences.