Editor’s Note: It is an increasingly false impression that China’s talents are lost overseas. In fact, the gap between the number of people who returned from overseas and those going abroad is shrinking each year. An estimated 353,500 students returned to China last year, up 29.5 percent compared with 2012. Meanwhile, the growth rate for students going abroad in 2013 to study was only 3.58 percent.

Based on the average rate of China’s returnees over the last 10 years, it is estimated that by 2019, for the first time in history, the number of overseas students returning to China will overtake that of Chinese students going abroad. This transition will transform China from the county with the largest outflow of students to a nation that is attracting top-notch talent at the highest rate in the world.

Zhu Yanmin, President of Jinjilie Overseas Education Consultants

"Turning back the clock to several years ago, students who were going abroad for graduate schools were becoming the main force of our market, which was gradually replaced by students who seek higher education overseas."

Sun Jianming, director of Chinese Service Center for Scholarly Exchange

"The main reason that facilitated the accelerated return of overseas Chinese students is China's steady economic growth which has provided overseas students more opportunities to utilize theirs talents and abilities back home."

Xiong Yu, Senior Lecturer and Associate Professor at University of East Anglia

"Sadly, though China is becoming more and more attractive, I do not think this would have too much affect on the number of people who take the initiative to come home, unless they are forced to do so."