Interview to Director of Confucius Institute of Barcelona Minkang Zhou

From http://www.segre.com/detall-de-la-noticia/article/el-xines-es-percep-com-a-sortida-professional/ (in Catalan)

Minkang Zhou, Director of the Foundation of the Confucius Institute of Barcelona, has been interviewed by the newspaper Segre after his conference at the Institut d'Estudis Ilerdencs in Lleida on the Chinese studies around the world.

He explained that in the last few years Chinese government has realized that Chinese culture and language are largely unknown in the rest of the world and that's the reason why they are investing on the creation of institutes around the world where they can be learned. He also stated that China is a very ancient civilization and this could be of interest for many people. He also mentioned that the development of the last 30 years has created an increasing gap between rich and poor peoples and also has given more freedom to Chinese people. Because of this, they are migrating both from rural areas to the large cities, but aso migrating to other areas of the world, like Catalonia, which is also receiving an increasing number of Chinese tourists. And finally he mentioned that in Catalonia there is an increasing number of people who are studying Chinese language, which is seen by the growth of the number of people who take the examinations.