Sources from an annual meeting on the employment of foreign cultural and educational specialists held on Thursday said that the specialists are from 73 countries, with the United States and Japan being the two largest sources of professionals.

Beijing first employed specialists from the former Soviet Union to help with urban construction and planning in the 1950s.

More foreign specialists are expected to be invited to work in the capital as a result of Beijing's successful bid to hold the Olympic Games in 2008 and China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO), said a senior official with State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs.

The official added that a range of measures will be issued this year to standardize the invitation of foreign specialists to work in China, including short-term training of employed foreign specialists for new jobs and the establishment of a system of authorizing domestic work units or giving overseas intermediate organizations the right to hire foreign specialists for Chinese employers, and a system of qualification of foreign specialists.

(People’s Daily January 25, 2002)