RELEVANCE OF SPANISH LANGUAGE IN CHINA

Every year 50,000 students in China get involved in learning and studies of the Spanish and more than 100 universities have a Spanish language department.

Spanish is gaining ground by leaps as a second language in China to other languages such as French or German. Only the omnipresent English surpasses the Spanish language as the linguistic goal that a large part of the Chinese population wants to reach. These positive data displays a great future a head for Spanish in China: there is a strong relationship between China and Latin America, As china has become the most important become the most important trading partner for some of the most important Spanish countries in Latin America (as Chile and Peru). There are more than 30 free trade agreements between Latin America and the Asia Pacific region, and Asia is now the second largest customer of Latin American exports: China alone is the second largest trading partner for Latin American countries with a movement that almost exceeded 160,000 million dollars in 2017 (a volume that has multiplied by 22 in the last 15 years). Some relevant facts of this relationship are as follows:

• During the last 5 years, China (through financing and direct investment) has made and average annual investments of than 5,000 million dollars

• Currently China has more than 70 infrastructure projects underway in Latin America and has generated 2 million jobs during the period 2000-2017 in Latin America

In addition to the above, China enjoys good political and economic relations with Spain, with a positive trend in investment volume from China in Spain (in 2016, this investment from China in Spain reached a volume of 1,880 million dollars).

In addition, studying abroad in US and UK is an objective for many parents of

international School students in China; learning Spanish can greatly enhance a student’s chances with pursuing higher education in those countries. Also, in International School students must select a second language (in addition of English), and Spanish is one of the most popular options for this as it has become a great competitive advantage.

There are other reasons of Spanish which explain the popularity of Spanish in China as its cultural expressions (including Hispanic/ Latino) music, cinema, books and that Spain and the rest of Spanish speaking countries are a popular option for Chinese tourists.

Overall relevance of the Spanish language worldwide

On top of the above Spanish has a great relevance from a global perspective because it is spoken by 580 million people making it the second language in terms of native speakers globally only after Chinese. Is the official language in more than 20 countries and is the second most spoken language in USA, with more than 50 million speakers in 2019 (this number is expected to rise to 127 million speakers by 2050).