On November 30th, “The 2020 Symposium of China Eastern Airlines & Colleges and Universities from China and Italy” which was jointly hosted by China Eastern Airlines, Global Times, Nankai University, Luiss University and Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies was successfully hold online. The theme of this symposium was “the effect of the cooperation between civil airlines from China and Italy on the cultural and tourist exchanges of these two countries”. And about 30 distinguished guests including media, representative of enterprises and scholars from colleges and universities from five places of two countries, Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, Rome and Pisa, attend this activity. Among these participants, there were Professor Yan Guodong, Dean of the College of Foreign Languages in Nankai University and Director of the Center of International and Regional Studies in Nankai University, Associate Professor Yang Lin, Head of the Department of Italy and a foreign teacher Letizia Vallini from the Department of Italy.
Professor Yan Guodong delivered a speech on behalf of Nankai University, expressing his pleasure for the cooperation with universities from Italy in research. He pointed out that the outlook for Italian major in the College of Foreign Languages in Nankai University was promising and the team of Italian Studies in the Center of International and Regional Studies in Nankai University had a great capacity for research and made remarkable achievements, and hoped to cooperate with colleges and universities from Italy and contribute to the research which was jointly conducted by civil airlines and tourism from both China and Italy.
In the speech of Professor Raffaele Marchetti, Vice President of Luiss University, he held a positive attitude to the future cooperation between China and Italy and its development, expressed his firm belief that civil airlines and tourism would soon resume their normal operation and pointed out the significance of promoting relations between two countries. Professor Alberto Di Minin, Head of the research team of Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies, Italian Dean of Confucius Institute in Pisa and Director of Galileo Galilei Italian Institute in Chongqing University said in his address that under the global epidemic situation, each party “flew the Internet” in a digital form and hoped that we would achieve a speedy victory in the fight against COVID-19 and could fly around the world on the plane of China Eastern Airlines.
Yang Lin who took the lead in the research project introduced the overall idea of the report to participants. She said that this project aimed to explore the effect of the cooperation between civil airlines from China and Italy on the cultural and tourist exchanges of these two countries through investigating the development of China Eastern Airlines in Italy.
Next, Yang Lin, Silvia Menegazzi, assistant professor for International Relation and Asian Studies in the Department of Politics of Luiss University and founding member of the “Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies”, Stefano Franco，lecturer in the Business Management Department of Luiss University, Marco Bonaglia, doctoral student majoring in Tourism Management in Chongqing University and teaching assistant in Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Antonio Crupi, post-doctoral assistant research fellow in the College of Management of Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies and member of the Management of Technology Innovation group in the Institute of Manufacturing of University of Cambridge and Letizia Vallini respectively reported their study achievements in terms of the history of cooperation in civil airlines between China and Italy, the effect on the collaboration in and development of two countries’ tourisms, challenges and opportunities, triggered by COVID-19 pandemic, for two countries’ cooperation in civil airlines and tourism, which promoted participants’ overall understanding of this research project.
Then, staff representatives of China Eastern Airlines shared their anti-pandemic experience and their research and development ideas of the product “Wild Your Weekends” and interacted with participants in the form of question and answer. Letizia Vallini asked them about the problems encountered during his report writing and got helpful feedback.
Finally, scholars attending this symposium widely discussed the challenges and opportunities faced by China Eastern Airlines during the COVID pandemic and offered constructive suggestions on how civil aviation enterprises can make contribution to promoting international cultural exchanges and development and fostering bilateral cooperation between China and Italy. The online symposium connecting five places from two countries successfully came to an end in the enthusiastic discussion of each party.
The year 2020 witnessed the 50th anniversary of the establishment of China-Italy diplomatic relations. Teachers in the College of Foreign Studies in Nankai University took the lead and cooperated with scholars from colleges and universities in Italy in conducting the research project which is hoped to provide the cooperation in civil airlines and tourism between China and Italy with theoretical support, advance in innovation among the exchanges of ideas and culture between these two countries and contribute to promoting their friendship.
