The China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) announced yesterday that it has been awarded funding from the European Community to provide education for people from the country's disadvantaged regions.

The Europe-China Business Management Training Project will receive 11.1 million euros (US$16.4 million) from the European Community over the next five years, with this sum being matched by the Shanghai municipal government.

"The project will bring a number of new developments to CEIBS, focusing on the central goal of transferring high-level, practically-oriented business knowledge from the EU to China," said Rolf Cremer, vice president and dean of CEIBS, a joint venture between China and the EU.

He said that 60 scholarships, 12 each year, will be set up over the next five years to bring students from disadvantaged areas, especially western regions.

"Access to modern business education is practically difficult for people in these regions, because they have not enough money to pay for the tuition," Cremer said, adding that women's enrollment in business management education remains low.

With the money, CEIBS will also launch a pilot PhD program and deliver business management training focusing on responsibility and leadership.

Zhang Weijiong, CEIBS vice president and co-dean, said the institution will strive to further improve in order to compete with the increasing number of international business schools coming to China.

(China Daily December 1, 2007)