The “Co-operative Development of Vocational Education Across Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei & Industry and Education Partnering Meeting Concerning Modern Service Industry” was held recently in Tianjin. In the meeting, 26 vocational colleges and 22 enterprises from Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province reached the “Tianjin Consensus” –with the purpose of coordinating the development of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province so as to promote the regional development of modern service industry, foster the innovative technical and highly skilled talents of individuals and work together to promote the innovative development of modern vocational education.

To achieve this purpose, the institutions and enterprises will set up four cooperative platforms for the coordinated development of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province.
• “Human resources demand information sharing platform,” to strengthen the joint construction and sharing of regional demand information for human resources.
• “Regional platform of institutions and enterprises for industry and education integration,” to fully integrate the excellent resources of the government, industry, enterprise, universities and colleges and research institutes in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province, and set up the “Cooperative alliance of institutions and enterprises for integrating the modern service industry with the vocation education and industry,”
• “Communication and exchange platform of teachers and students,” so as to work together to set up the communication and exchange mechanism of teachers and students in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province, as well as complement the advantages among the teachers and intensify the education and teaching technique communications;
• “Regional study platform of modern service industry,” so as to introduce the world advanced development ideology and practical experience, and integrate the excellent scientific and research resources for carrying out the forward-looking study on modern service industry together.

Analysis: following the cross-province development of vocational institutions as described above, the institutions and industries in the three provinces/cities will be able to leverage on the synergy and favourable policy framework to launch/expand more projects with a larger impact as well as be able to attract students with better academic performance and financial capability and better talents. As such, there could be more opportunities for both student mobility and partner relationships establishment/expansion for UK institutions. Furthermore, there could be more industry-institution cooperation opportunities for joint research, cooperation training and student employability enhancement for the UK as well.