Foreigners in Beijing now account for around 1 percent of the capital's population.

According to a report released at the weekend by the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, the number of overseas nationals living in the city now exceeds 170,000, which is slightly more than 1 percent of the capital's official population of 17.55 million.

The exit and entry administration of the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau said the number of long-term expats in the city last year was 110,000.

The population of foreigners includes those living and working in Beijing as well as overseas students and tourists. Tourists are usually thought of as a floating population and are not counted but researchers took them into consideration this year because they said their number is stable in the long term.

Analysis said half of the expats who work in Beijing are involved in manufacturing, computer services and the software industry.

Foreign students in Beijing account for half of the total number of overseas students in China. They travel mainly to learn the language, but the number of those seeking higher education has increased recently.

Most students who travel to China for a higher education come from developing countries and major in the sciences, technology, economics, management and trading, rather than the Chinese language.

Huang Ranqing, a professor at Capital University of Economics and Business, told Beijing Daily that the fact that so many foreign students choose China shows they believe in its economic development and social stability.

Dai Jianzhong, researcher at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, told Beijing Daily the population of foreigners is one of the indexes by which the internalization level of a city is measured.

The index shows whether a city has attracted capital and talent, and whether it is active in global economics.

He added that the population of foreigners often accounts for more than 10 percent in other big cities. The number of foreigners is 25 percent of the population of Paris and 33 percent in London.

The report suggests that Beijing should try to increase the number of foreign nationals living in the capital and improve both the hard and soft environment to increase its attractiveness.

China Daily

(China Daily 10/11/2010 page)