Canada’s brand could also be enhanced by associating with iconic, highly visible projects in Asian countries. For example, Ottawa should push to achieve partner-country status for the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor, Asia’s largest building project (Japan is already there). It’s also time to revisit the argument to build a Sovereign Wealth Fund by pooling our resource rents.

Painting pandas on central London taxies is the latest campaign to raise awareness of the endangered Chinese animal. The campaign is jointly run by London Taxi Advertising and the Chengdu Association for Cultural Exchange with Foreign Countries in Chengdu, Sichuan province, which is home to more than 80 percent of the world's panda population.

The Chinese government has set up more than three hundred Confucius Institutes in 100 countries as part of a new push to boost its soft power. The centres are usually set up as a joint initiative among a host foreign university, a Chinese partner university and the Hanban, which runs the programme.

China urgently needs to carry out more effective public diplomacy if it is to overcome the misunderstandings, prejudice and suspicions that people in other countries have toward it. Public diplomacy is an indispensable part of a country's approach to foreign relations as well as an important supplement to its traditional diplomacy. Effective public diplomacy is essential if a nation is to promote its national interests and achieve its foreign policy objectives.

Hu's next trip to Australia - now as leader - was in October 2003. The Chinese had suggested the visit, with Hu flying on directly after the APEC leaders' summit in Bangkok. The Howard government was pleased and arranged for Hu to visit Canberra on the Thursday. But then US president George W. Bush said that he, too, would like to visit Australia after APEC, nominating the Thursday as his preferred time.

In cooperation with Fredrikstad municipality in Norway, the Hong Kong based Theatre Studio and the Norwegian theatre lab Studium Actoris have initiated a three-year long cultural exchange program which is to culminate in a theatre production celebrating the 150 years jubilee of Norway and China’s most famous painters, Edward Munch and Qi Bashi.