The Lancang-Mekong Youth Exchange and Cooperation Center was inaugurated in Shanghai on July 22 after eight universities from China, Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam signed a memorandum.

The center aims to enhance youth exchange, cooperation and development among the six countries and will focus on projects involving cultural exchange, university cooperation, youth innovation and entrepreneurship, transnational social practice and university think-tank construction.Establishment of the center turns the page on a new chapter of youth exchange among the six countries and will further enhance friendship among the people of the Lancang-Mekong River Basin, declared Nay Win Oo, deputy director-general of the Ministry of Education of Myanmar.The institution will serve as one of the functional platforms of the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation (LMC) mechanism under the five-year development plan of the LMC.

Over the past three years since the launch of the LMC, a series of organizations have been arranged such as the Lancang-Mekong water resources cooperation center, the Lancang-Mekong environmental cooperation center and global center for Mekong River studies.