Well, I think if we look at some of the countries that do have more specific strategies toward China, Australia comes up very frequently. There's been a strategy that transcends individual governments that has been very helpful in continuing to help some policies move forward. There's a goal, for example, that I believe it's 12% of school leavers, people who graduate from schools in Australia, will speak an Asian language. So there are some goals that help to deepen the whole country's perspective on that, and there's been some work done.
Recently there was an Asia competency study done that David Mulroney, our former ambassador, took the lead on. One of the things he noted was that it's more difficult for us to get as many Canadian students to want to travel over to China and study there or live there than it is to attract Chinese students to come here. When they explored that a little bit more deeply, they discovered that those students said, “Well when I go apply for a job upon graduation, the companies who are looking to hire me aren't telling me that they value that experience I would have gained during my semester or my year abroad.” You can see where, if you can have a bit more of a comprehensive approach there, it could be helpful.
If I think about a couple of comments about the U.K. or Europe, for example, I noted recently that the European Union funded a very big project that we noted with interest because we have an incubation initiative to try to help these SMEs to do business in China better. They had done it on a European basis with some very good reports and things like that. The U.K. itself has many more trade offices in China, for example, than Canada does. It also funds quite directly some of the bilateral associations that are involved.
We are completely independent as a council. Our counterpart in Britain is not, and I'm not asking for money from the government, but it just shows a difference in approach.