The World Young Scientist Summit opened on Saturday in Wenzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, gathering more than 800 scientists and entrepreneurs from over 60 countries and regions.
The event also features an exhibition center outside the main conference venue, with innovative products designed for real-world applications drawing visitors from around the world.
Many are looking beyond the displays to explore potential partnerships, with innovations ranging from the recycling of valuable minerals from construction waste to artificial intelligence (AI) applications across industries.
"Our new approach to handling solid waste uses low-carbon, firing-free and low-temperature rapid-drying processes to turn various types of solid waste into industrial raw and auxiliary materials and recycled building materials," said Shao Zhang, vice president of the Wenzhou Hailuo Group.
"Because in Brazil, we don't have this kind of technology [of using] construction waste to build this. We have searched for new technology, and we are the representative association of engineers in Brazil. We came to China maybe to bring this technology to Brazil," said Leonardo Monteiro Rodrigues from the Brazilian Federation of Engineers.
Priyanga Talagala, a senior lecturer at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, highlighted the multilingual capability of an AI agent on display.
"It can understand many different languages. Actually, we are from Sri Lanka, and we tried with our own mother tongue, and she could understand our language very easily, even though it's not very common all around the world," she said.
A wheelchair caught the eyes of Ashutosh Tiwari, secretary general of the International Association of Advanced Materials, which is headquartered in Sweden. Tiwari said he had decided to introduce the product to the European market in cooperation with the Chinese exhibitor.
"So I've taken a picture of the company. And officially, our office will contact [them] to start the business in Sweden and Europe," he said.
New technologies draw global young scientists to Wenzhou
Amidst overlapping global challenges, international experts at the 2026 Global Governance Forum in north China's Hebei Province emphasized that rebuilding confidence and cooperation in global governance requires enhanced dialogue, the establishment of common rules in emerging fields, and a fairer, more inclusive international system that amplifies the voice of the Global South.
Held from October 23 to 25 in Xiong'an, China's "city of the future" built on the North China Plain, the forum brought together nearly 400 representatives from over 90 countries. Spanning five major sectors and 22 thematic seminars, the event provided a platform for diverse stakeholders in politics, economy, technology, culture, and think tanks to jointly address governance challenges and promote inclusive, multi-stakeholder global governance reform.
"In this conference, I met some American representatives, a remarkable businessman. I asked him, 'what are you doing here?' And he said, 'I wanted to discuss Global Governance Initiative.' I said, 'Listen, I don't believe because whatever China proposes, the U.S. will object. And he said no. And he mentioned specific subject -- AI. He said, 'I want to make my humble contribution into establishing (of) global governance in AI.' So among Americans, this idea is also receiving some understanding. More dialogue is required and I would underline the weight of this forum," said Djoomart Otorbaev, former prime minister of Kyrgyzstan.
In today's world, where deficits in peace, development, security, and governance are intertwined, rebuilding confidence and cooperation is the most scarce international public good. In response, China has proactively set the agenda to address pressing concerns, such as advancing the reform of the UN-centered governance system, cooperating on new frontiers like cyberspace, outer space, and AI, and bridging civilizational divides amidst geopolitical rivalry.
"And there were some specific initiatives which we also have discussed, which is to set the global governance for the outer space, for the deep seas, for some areas of the planet like the Antarctica, where there is various needs for more common rules. One area the world is looking for is artificial intelligence and we need to regulate globally and efficient intelligence to avoid the worst. So if we work together, we can get the benefits and make sure that we make it much more difficult to do the harm," said Erik Solheim, chairman of the EU-Asia Centre and former UN under-secretary-general and former executive director of the UN Environment Programme.
"The world has become a global village, but this global village is now fighting. There's a problem going on in the Middle East, there's a problem going on in Africa, but China is trying to promote a conclusive thing so that the world can be peaceful. Because of this Global Governance Initiative, China has been able to tell the world (that) how to work together," said Khalid Taimur Akram, executive director of the Pakistan Research Center for a Community with a Shared Future.
Since its proposal over a year ago, the Global Governance Initiative has garnered support and responses from over 160 countries and international organizations.
During the forum, China announced pragmatic measures to further implement the initiative, reaffirming its firm support for multilateralism and the core status of the United Nations, while emphasizing the need to enhance the representation and voice of the Global South in international affairs to translate the initiative from a Chinese proposal into broader international practice.
"It's that combination of defense of the games that arise from the existence of the international system, but improving it, updating it, performing it, making it fairer, particularly to the great mass of developing countries, which is why the Chinese proposals meet a lot of support, particularly from the Global South, but also from fair minded people in other countries," said Keith Bennett, vice chairman of UK 48 Group Club.
Participants of Global Governance Forum hail China's contribution to fairer international order
