The university began to recruit international students in 1986 and had trained more than 20,000 international students from more than 80 countries by 2019, says Huang Xiaojuan, the university's vice-president.

Since 1993 Chinese students from the university have gone to countries including Indonesia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam as part of exchange projects, she says.

The academy also works with more than 100 universities in more than 20 countries and regions on various projects.

More than 60 percent of these are "stable, substantive and long-term", including teacher training, student training, and scientific research cooperation, Feng says.