Foreign Experts are Helping to Save Parts of China!

Source: ChinaDaily

A German expert who has been obsessed with "ecological water conservancy" in Suzhou, Jiangsu province, for 11 years counts a river in Zhoushi town, Kunshan, among his successes.

Previously, we covered news about foreigners doing great things in China as well:

• The Brave Woman Who Spent Her Life Savings in China
  

• This City Allows Expats to Help Maintain Laws?
  

• Expats Teach English for Free - Why and How?

• Heroic Expat Saves Man's Life Then Disappears!

• Former HK Expat Saves Man's Life During Race, in China

The river's pollution had nagged away at the local government. Despite three rounds of treatment, the result was unsatisfactory and letters of complaint continued in droves.

At that time, Gunther Geller, a world-class constructed wetlands expert, came to work in the Suzhou Industrial Park.

He is a leading member at Dehua Eco Tech, a Sino-German joint venture on ecological engineering. The company, set up in the park in 2008, provides planning, design, construction, operation and data management services for towns and townships.

Geller is also president at the German Ecological Engineering Society and has worked in ecological management worldwide for four decades.

Similar to the 20-plus projects that Geller managed in Suzhou, the river in Kunshan, a county-level city, changed radically. Water quality improved and local residents were attracted back to it.

Wang Jianming, a professor from Suzhou University of Science and Technology, said ecological remediation is the most complex and difficult task in ecological management. Remediation of the river in Kunshan is an example for solving this type of problem nationwide, he said.

Geller is among numerous foreign experts that Suzhou has attracted in recent years.

The Suzhou Industrial Park launched a recruitment plan in 2007. It has since attracted more than 4,800 foreign-funded projects and more than 4,000 scientific and technological innovation companies as well as 18 listed enterprises.

Now, 13,000 foreign people work in Suzhou, accounting for about half of the foreigners in Jiangsu province. By the end of 2018, 4,293 foreigners had worked for innovation and startups in the industrial park, which is home to about one-sixth of such companies in Jiangsu.

The 17th Conference on International Exchange of Professionals, held in Shenzhen in April, announced results of "Amazing China 2018the Most Attractive Chinese Cities for Expats". Suzhou ranked sixth, its eighth time on the list.

The city used many ideas to attract expats. It has issued more than 22,800 work permits for foreigners since April 2017. It also established comprehensive centers that can help high-level foreign professionals solve residence, schooling of children and healthcare issues.

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