A participant attends the 13th Meeting of the China-Africa Think Tanks Forum in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, March 8, 2024. (Photo by Herman Emmanuel/Xinhua)

The 13th Meeting of the China-Africa Think Tanks Forum opened in Tanzania's port city of Dar es Salaam on Friday, with participants describing it as a springboard for the continent's economic and industrialization agenda.

DAR ES SALAAM, March 9 (Xinhua) -- The 13th Meeting of the China-Africa Think Tanks Forum opened in Tanzania's port city of Dar es Salaam on Friday, with participants describing it as a springboard for the continent's economic and industrialization agenda.

More than 300 participants from 50 countries, including scholars, experts, representatives of international organizations in Tanzania, diplomatic envoys, government officials, and entrepreneurs, participated in the forum through a combination of online and offline means.

The forum focuses on exploring China-Africa cooperation mechanisms, strategic initiatives, and practical actions in the fields of industrialization, agricultural modernization, and human resources training, said James Mdoe, deputy permanent secretary in the Tanzanian Ministry of Education, Science and Technology.

A participant attends the 13th Meeting of the China-Africa Think Tanks Forum in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, March 8, 2024. (Photo by Herman Emmanuel/Xinhua)

Opening the one-day forum, Mdoe said the meeting has fostered a positive atmosphere in academia and society for stronger Africa-China relations.

He added that Africa and China must figure out ways to deepen cooperation and seek to demonstrate the instrumental role that education can play in building strong societies.

Nelson Boniface, deputy vice chancellor of the University of Dar es Salaam, called for increased cooperation between Tanzanian and China on academic and research projects in various fields, including science, education, humanities and social sciences, engineering, and technology, to meet the two countries' demands.

A participant attends the 13th Meeting of the China-Africa Think Tanks Forum in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, March 8, 2024. (Photo by Herman Emmanuel/Xinhua)

Chen Mingjian, Chinese ambassador to Tanzania, said China and Africa have a shared desire to explore development paths independently and work together to build a high-quality China-Africa community with a shared future.

The forum released a document on the consensus of China-Africa think tanks on deepening cooperation on global development. It also released an initiative on building a China-Africa think tank cooperation network, which is in Chinese, English, and French, calling for the strengthening of China-Africa think tanks' cooperation and the building of a cooperation network to promote mutual understanding and common development between the two sides.

The forum was jointly organized by Zhejiang Normal University in east China, the Chinese Embassy in Tanzania, the Department of Foreign Affairs of Zhejiang Provincial People's Government, and the Jinhua Municipal People's Government in east China's Zhejiang Province. It was supported by Xinhua News Agency Africa Regional Bureau, the University of Dar es Salaam, and the China-Africa Fund for Industrial Cooperation.  ■