James Dyson, founder of Dyson Ltd Photo: Courtesy of Dyson Ltd

 

Amongst the hand shaking and trade deals of this week's state visit of President Xi Jinping to the UK, a transformation is underway. It's not happening in London but in an inconspicuous part of the British channel near Bristol. Chinese engineers will shortly be arriving to save Britain from its looming energy crisis by building the UK's next generation of nuclear reactors at Hinkley Point. The 2 billion pound ($3.1 billion) deal is China's first such agreement in a Western nation.

It's not just a step forward for Sino-British relations; it heralds a leap forward for Chinese engineering.

While China embarks on its "Go Out Policy" with gusto, Britain seems to have lost its way. As a Briton I can't help but wonder - why do we need Chinese help?

The UK once opened the world's first civil nuclear reactor in the 1950s. Where we once led, now we follow. China is set to invest 105 billion pounds in British infrastructure by 2025, according to a report by the Centre for Economics and Business Research in London and the law firm Pinsent Masons.

Defined by a passion for science and progress, Chinese firms are finding worldwide demand to meet their healthy engineering appetite.

The problem for the UK lies at the very roots - in education. This is where Britain must learn from China. Successive British governments have undervalued engineering, science and maths and instead focused on encouraging more students into law, finance and media studies. We've stood still while aspiring countries like China have embraced engineering.

According to UNESCO, China has 1.3 million engineering graduates per year, including 650,000 university graduates. Conversely by 2020, Britain will have a deficit of 610,000 engineers. It means the UK can only theorize the future of nuclear technology rather than actually produce enough minds to physically build the plants.

Numbers don't always tell the whole story, I should confess. It's not all bad news. Despite our engineering deficit, the UK remains a home to high technology and advanced sciences. Engineering firms like JCB, Jaguar Land Rover and Rolls Royce show that cutting edge technology is still being developed and exported to the world, including China. At Dyson we are finding that the appetite for quality British engineering and advanced appliances is enabling our success in countries ranging from America, to Germany, South Korea and China.

The trouble is that there simply aren't enough of us high technology exporters left in the UK. We need a thousand more if Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne is to reach his stated aim of making China Britain's second-largest trading partner within the next 10 years.

One way the UK should be plugging the deficit is by better leveraging our universities and increasing the number of people enrolled in science, technology and engineering degrees.

We are lucky enough to be home to many of the world's best institutions so the foundations are in place. British universities deliver more papers and citations per pound invested than any other G8 country and account for around 14 percent of the top research papers produced globally.

This is something worth noting for Chinese universities, which while undoubtedly world class and brimming with ideas, still rely too heavily on delivering volume of research rather than quality.

Tsinghua University might be No.1 worldwide for having its name attached to engineering research papers, but when it comes to the 10 percent of publications most cited it scores down at 167. More collaboration between British and Chinese institutions could help bridge the gap.

The cultural connections between the UK and China in education already run deep. Today, 135,000 Chinese students are enrolled to study in the UK. Dyson is sponsoring two of these bright Chinese minds with generous scholarships at the University of Manchester. This is a great example of how our two countries can collaborate and enrich each other: Chinese students working alongside Dyson's engineers and scientists to deliver new, better cleaning and purifying technologies that one day might end up back in Chinese homes to improve their everyday lives.

We would love to work with more bright Chinese minds but it's getting harder to keep hold of them here in the UK. Unfortunately the British government welcomes foreign students with open arms, only to close the door and boot them out once they graduate.

George Osborne might have told the Shanghai Stock Exchange that he wants to make it easier to study and travel in the UK but his words are in contrast to those of the Business Secretary who wants to "break the link" between foreign nationals studying in the UK and staying on after they graduate. We need a clear message. Britain should be open for business, and should welcome China's academic elite with open arms.

Britain needs brains to bring its ideas to life and infrastructure to power its future. China wants education and has an appetite for new technology. It's clear that both countries have so much to offer each other. The future is bright if we are willing to invent it together.

The author is a British inventor and the eponymous founder of Dyson Ltd. He was appointed provost of London's Royal College of Art in 2011. bizopinion@globaltimes.com.cn

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