Recent weeks have brought signs that China could be — slowly — starting to let in overseas students shut out of the country for over two years.

On June 20, Li Jiming, China’s ambassador to Bangladesh, announced that China is planning to allow international students to return, stating that Bangladeshis would be “first in line”. That same day, Pakistan’s education minister Rana Tanveer, accompanied more than 100 China-bound students — the first batch from Pakistan — to the airport in Islamabad ahead of their flight back.

Yet halfway through 2022, foreign students hoping to return to China seem, by and large, to be in the same boat they were in when the year began: no closer to returning to their disrupted studies. At a time when much of the world is moving into pandemic recovery mode, loosening border restrictions and mask mandates, China has opened the door barely a crack. Of the nearly 500,000 international students in the country before Covid, only a small fraction have returned. And that’s not about to change any time soon, say analysts.

“We don’t believe this year will witness a surging inflow of international students. We see no signals of loosening (the) zero-Covid policy,” says Claudia Wang, a partner in Oliver Wyman, a Hong Kong-based education consultancy. “That means there will still be strict quarantine provisions and the international air routes capacity will not fully recover.” Yet she is positive about Chinese universities’ resilience. “I’m not too worried (in the) mid-to-long run, as long as China improves the whole ecosystem supporting international students,” she adds.

But those hoping for a speedy return may be disappointed. In 2018, the last year in which China provided official data on international enrolments, it counted 492,000 foreign students in the country. The largest group was from Korea, with about 50,000 — who have since been allowed to re-enter the country.

But its next largest cohorts have yet to return. Some 29,000 Thai, 28,000 Pakistani students and 23,000 from India are still waiting for the green light, as are sizeable contingents from the US and Russia. In the meantime, China should be working to ensure that foreign students are a priority once its borders do open up, advise analysts.

According to Wang, even before Covid, growth in new international enrolments had slowed, prompting Beijing to realise it needs to “further enhance degree programme quality (and the) nationality mix of international students”, to boost full-time degree enrolment. She is confident that “more best-of-breed programmes, better job placement pathways and visa policy” will attract more students from abroad.

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