To promote the development of China's Tibetan study, China's related institutions and their scholars have continued to conduct academic exchanges of all forms. Academic conferences on Tibetan study are held annually, as are many lectures on special topics, symposiums and classes for advanced studies. Some institutions will also send visiting scholars to related schools in other cities for joint study on important research projects.
Since 1980 , exchanges between China and foreign Tibetan study circles have also become more active. In almost every international academic conference on Tibetan study held in a foreign country, Chinese scholars will be seen; also, Chinese Tibetan study scholars are often invited abroad to give lectures and conduct cooperative research. Meanwhile, more and more foreign scholars are visiting China to take part in academic activities of all kinds. After its establishment, the Center for Tibetan Study of China itself received scholars from foreign countries and regions of Hong Kong and Macao numbering several hundred people. There is also a large number of foreign students who come to China to study Tibetology. In recent years, China has frequently organized international academic conferences on Tibetan study in Beijing and Lhasa. Scholars from Britain, France, Japan, India, Mongolia, Czechoslovak the former Soviet Union, as well as regions of Taiwan and Hong Kong, have been invited to these conferences. Meantime, the works of some foreign scholars have also been translated into Chinese and published. Some of China's research institutions have also signed agreements of cooperation with foreign research organizations, All these activities have enhanced understanding and friendship between China and Foreign Tibetan study circles. They play a very positive role in promoting the development of international Tibet study. Also, because of China's opening up policy, the academic exchanges between China and foreign Tibetan study circles are expected to become even broader and smoother in the future.
As I end this article, l am happy to report that under the joint efforts of concerned units, China will soon publish the Catalogue of Chinese Publications on Tibetan Study. This large reference work will be published in Tibetan, Chinese and English. It will provide fruits of China's complete and systematic information reflecting the Tibetan study circle in the years after the founding of new China. As a result of this book, readers will be deeply impressed by new China' s efforts and successes in protecting the historical and cultural heritage of the Tibetan nationality, as well as in developing Tibet's brilliant traditional culture, and in promoting development of Tibetan study. For myself, 1 hope it will also remedy possible omissions and errors in this article.