Confucius Institute/Hanban Funding

The Chinese government through Hanban and the Confucius Institutes is spending a tremendous amount of money funding Chinese studies.

Currently there are 523 Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms in 87 countries and regions across the globe. The Confucius Classroom in Hacienda Heights will include a Chinese Teacher and 1000 books to start. My guess is the operating cost for China per year per classroom is $100,000. The goal is to have 1000 institutes world wide by 2020, and the program only started in 2004.

The one at Western Michigan State costs $150,000 per year for a Confucius Institute with matching funding from the college.

523 X $100,000 is about $52 Million dollars per year. This is probably a very low figure.

Hanban Activities:

• Free Textbooks
• Confucius Institutes
• Teacher training for foreign Chinese Culture and Language experts to China.
• Confucius Institute Scholarships
• Supplying of Chinese Teachers to the US.

My guess is the total support for Hanban from the Chinese government is in the hundreds of million dollars per year and is seen as a soft power outreach. And with the huge interest in Learning Chinese and lack of resources, it's a win win for all involved parties.

References:

• A message from Confucius - New ways of projecting soft power - The Economist

• Hacienda La Puente Unified school board votes to implement 'Confucius Classroom - SG Tribune
• WMU has nation’s newest Confucius Institute - Hanban.com