CRI听力:China: A Land of Opportunities for Overseas Graduates?

The robust momentum of the Chinese economy is luring many fresh graduates from North America and Europe to seek jobs in China. At the same time, however, concerns are arising: does China provide foreign job seekers with a lot of opportunity? And will Chinese college graduates be edged out by the influx of foreign talent? Our reporter Zhao Kun tries to find the answers.

Reporter:
Anthony Cruise arrived in Beijing from Leicester, England three weeks ago. He has never been to China before. He doesn't speak Mandarin, but to Anthony's surprise, job-hunting in Beijing is far more encouraging than back home in the UK.(www.hXen.com)

"Say, in a local newspaper in England, you got at least 40 to 50 people going for one job. I applied for a lot of jobs back home without any success. But here in Beijing, within a few days, I put an ad on the internet. I had 20 job offers."

Anthony will soon start to teach English at a local language training school, a typical job many English speakers usually start with in China.

Rosy King graduated from an American college last year and now interns at a PR firm in Beijing. Although her major task is not to teach English, it's still very much about the language - polishing English scripts. In spite of that, she finds the prospects of getting an offer from the firm very bleak.

"Because of the economic downturn right now, it's actually more difficult for people like me to find an entry-level job here because the companies can find Chinese people who speak English really well. They don't have to pay them as much as they have to pay foreigners. Foreigners generally have a higher salary and many of them won't work for Chinese wages."

Rosy says a native speaker can easily get an English teaching job since a good command of English is basically all that's needed for such positions. But when it comes to other fields calling for more professional skills, it's just as hard as finding a job in the States, especially for recent college graduates without any professional job experience.

But this will not reverse the trend that an increasing number of college graduates from overseas choose to try their luck in China, says Liu Erduo, a professor from the Labor and Human Resources School at Renmin University. However, he adds that the trend is still a far cry from developing into a wave.

"There remains a small number of overseas college graduates looking for jobs in China and the job market here will hardly feel the pinch from these outsiders in at least 8 to 10 years."

He points out that Japan and Hong Kong saw an influx of labor force from America and the European countries in the early 1970s. As China becomes an integral part of the world economy, the country's indigenous job hunters will also experience the impact from foreign talent in the long run.

Nevertheless, triggered by the worsening economy, the sharp increase in the amount of foreign college graduates in China's job market may suggest a potential getaway any time when the economy in the West looks up.

Sophie Leung is a Londoner now looking for a job in Beijing.

"I will go back to London in maybe one or two years, maybe three years. I don't know. It depends on what opportunities I can get. But I certainly plan to go back to England within two or three years."

It seems that is the strategy for most foreign college graduates in China - to stave off the economic impact at the moment and return for better opportunities as the economy resurges in their home countries.

For China Drive, I'm Zhao Kun.