The Online Training Workshop on Big Data jointly held by the International Knowledge Centre for Engineering Sciences and Technology (IKCEST) and the International Science, Technology and Innovation Centre for South-South Cooperation (ISTIC) was successfully held from November 16 to 18, 2020, which was attended by more than 170 people from 24 countries, including Malaysia, Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Trinidad and Tobago, etc.

On the opening day of the training workshop, Liu Chang, Director of Division of International Cooperation from IKCEST, and Sharizad Dahlan, Director of ISTIC, extended welcome to participants and delivered speeches. Liu Chang mentioned that one of IKCEST’s missions is to provide knowledge services in the field of engineering sciences and technology to help developing countries cultivate talents and improve capacity building. ISTIC aims to facilitate South-South Cooperation (SSC) through science, technology and innovation. Based on the common vision, IKCEST and ISTIC signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation and established a long-term cooperation mechanism in 2017. The workshop has been successfully held for three years. This year’s training workshop has attracted more participants from different nationalities, educational backgrounds and professional fields, due to its diverse themes and flexible forms. As General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that SSC is a great initiative of partnership and self-improvement of developing countries, aiming to conduct cooperation on the basis of equality, mutual trust, mutual benefit for win-win results, solidarity and mutual assistance. It’s hoped that the participants gain fruitful results in the workshop and contribute to SSC in the future. Later, Zhang Ye at IKCEST Secretariat and Azim Noor at ISTIC Secretariat introduced the basic situation of the two centers respectively.

Special courses of the training workshop were provided by experts from IKCEST training base. Professors Lv Na, Tian Feng, Shi Bin and Luo Minnan from Xi’an Jiaotong University introduced basic knowledge about big data technologies such as big data, cloud computing, machine learning, and their application in medical and other professional fields.

On November 18, participants of the workshop had online communication, and the teachers Luo Minnan and Shi Bin answered their questions. Many participants said that the training was rich in content, practical and enlightening, which would be quite helpful for their future work. They hoped to participate in more activities organized by IKCEST in the future. Meanwhile, undergraduate students Oludotun and Bashir Abdullahi from Nigeria, Jagdish from Academy of Sciences Malaysia and other participants gave feedback and suggestions on the course setting, platform functions, organization and management of the workshop, such as considering the needs of policy makers to offer more targeted courses; teachers using simpler language to make participants better understand and digest the courses; extending registration time so that more new students can participate; adding the speed adjustment function of video courses; adding video subtitles; adding the download function on laptops.

This training workshop has effectively improved the data processing and analysis capabilities of students from developing countries, further enhanced the recognition of IKCEST, expanded IKCEST’s circle of friends, laid a foundation for working with overseas institutions in the future and jointly using big data technologies to solve practical problems. In the future, IKCEST and ISTIC will carry out more cooperation activities to jointly contribute to the realization of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).