By Xiaoxing Han/Foshan

The world has come to Qatar, at least the top global experts in education from 100+ countries. One thousand strong, they are drawn to the World Innovation Summit on Education (WISE) currently being held in Doha, to try to find solutions for the challenges of education that face all nations around the world. Qatar is once again in the spotlight, using its global reputation for excellence in education to create an international dialogue. 

I am a proud participant in WISE, coming from the Pearl River Delta in China. Just as Qatar is not familiar to millions of Chinese, it seems, by browsing Qatar newspapers, that for people in the Gulf, China is still as far as you could go in the age of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him).

What Jon Huntsman, the new US Ambassador to China, calls “the most dynamic economy” in today’s world has not been in the spotlights in the Gulf. The two edges of the Orient need to further close the geographic distance between them with important exchanges, in education, technology, culture and business.

One type of exchange that Qatar Foundation has put on the agenda of the Doha conference is innovation, particularly in education. Qatar has been doing the right things, in the right ways, and at the right times. China has got some things right for its part. In contrast to most other countries during the current financial crisis, China has weathered it well, as has Qatar.

The two nations, one giant in size and one small, also have each played leading roles in hosting major global sports events recently; Qatar hosted the Asian Games of 2006 and China the Olympics 2008. Each had achieved admirably spectacular results.

Kudos aside, the Near East and the Far East are still a noticeable distance away from the top of the world as one draws its primary wealth from the black goldmine while the other roots its strength in manufacturing might. Can both Qatar and China undergo a transformation to attain greater heights?

From a continent-sized nation like China, where I come from is tied to a river, Pearl River to be exact. With Hong Kong and Macao crouching at where the Pearl River meets the sea, the Pearl River Delta (PRD) creates what is, to quote Huntsman again, “the most dynamic neighbourhood” of that dynamite engine of the world economy. It was the only location of “special economic zone” sanctioned by the Chinese authority in the early days of the reform.

Other than Hong Kong and Macao, the PRD region has Guangzhou-Foshan at its heart and consists of seven other major cities. When counting Hong Kong and Macao in what’s called the Big PRD, the closely interconnected economic cluster becomes even more formidable. With a population of 28mn people, the PRD is approximately the size of Paris and London combined. In 2007, the combined GDP total of “the Big PRD” reached $637.5bn.

To put it in the perspective of the world wide ranking, “the Big PRD” will be only slightly behind the Netherlands (#18) and far ahead of Poland, Switzerland, and Sweden respectively.

Having enjoyed about 20 some years of low cost competitive advantage, the PRD started facing far stiffer competition, even before the onset of the current economic crisis, from abroad and domestically, from the inner lands of China. More value added and differentiated competition are widely recognised as the way out of the impasse. The question is how?

Here is where the concept of the creative cluster comes in. Education City in Qatar is one such cluster by itself, with components related to education. Following in the footsteps of Western pioneers, China rushed to build creative industry parks. By one account, from research undertaken by my own company, Foshan Creative Industry Park Investment & Management Co Ltd (FCIP), a leading creative industry park developer in southern China, there were over 600 parks that could be classified as creative or cultural creative industry parks in China by the end of 2008.

Like science and technology parks, creative industry parks work to attract creative entities to its premises. However, unlike the former, creative industry parks are more culturally oriented and more inclusive in sector acceptance. In other words, non-technology and yet creative entities have similar chances to be embraced.

The mission of creative industry park should be the promotion and boosting of creativity in its locale and beyond. One example taken from FCIP’s initiatives has much relevance to the very foresighted pursuit of Qatar Foundation. It’s called Creativity Commercialisation Contest launched in September 2009.

It is widely recognised that a major hurdle to creative individuals and enterprises, smaller ones in particular, is tremendous difficulties in turning a creative idea or a prototype into a profitable commodity. Some fail to find the right channel to market, some run out of funding before completing the formulation, some see their brainchild stolen from them, to name just a few adversities. As a contribution to addressing the overwhelming challenges to creative undertakings by “small guys”, FCIP introduced the contest.

The key requirement of the contestants is to come up with practical approaches capable of facilitating the commercialisation of creativity. It is bound to be a wakeup call for many who have dreamed of creativity but then teetered on giving up.

Against that context, the Creativity Commercialisation Contest resonates hugely among young people. Many of them joined in as mobilising activists, and far more step forward as contestants.

On October 18, over 1,100 students forming numerous contest teams arrived at FCIP to familiarise themselves with FCIP facilities and concepts, in preparation for their contest submissions. Over 100 business plans were submitted by the cut-off date for the first round of the contest.

Just as a consumable, finite carbon-based energy supply does not provide a solid foundation for civilisation, copycat manufacturing cannot render eternal prosperity either. Ultimately, it is innovation and creativity at all levels that can assure sustainable and superior growth.

The torch of Asian Games was passed from Doha to Guangzhou in 2006, and one hopes that the multidirectional innovation relay will continue from strength to strength, becoming more direct, more frequent, more substantive and more permanent.

n With a doctorate in comparative politics from Georgetown University and MIM from Thunderbird, American Graduate School for International Management, Xiaoxing Han is VP for Strategic & International Affairs of Foshan Creative Industry Park Investment & Management (FCIP), a leading developer and operator of creative industry parks in southern China. He is responsible for FCIP’s international operations, some strategic initiatives and its education platform that deals with innovative non-credit education of all ages. He is also an accomplished e-learning instructor, planner, and administrator.