CAIRO — Egypt and China have recently been working together to increase cooperation in various fields. On May 17, the Egyptian Ministry of Education announced that starting in 2022, a number of Egyptian public schools will teach Chinese as an optional foreign language.

The announcement came during a virtual meeting between Egypt’s Education Minister Tarek Shawki and China’s ambassador to Egypt to discuss joint educational projects between the two countries.

According to a statement by the Ministry of Education, the two officials discussed the enrollment of students at the Egypt Luban Workshop in cooperation with Tianjin Light Industry Vocational Technical College and Tianjin Transportation Vocational College, as part of efforts to promote technical education. The discussions also touched on cooperation with China’s NetDragon, which develops and operates online games, as part of a project to resolve the problem of overcrowded classrooms.

Two Luban workshops were inaugurated at Egypt’s Ain Shams University in November 2020 in cooperation with the Chinese universities of Tianjin. These workshops provide vocational training for students as part of China’s efforts to boost international cooperation in the education sector.