The program has been approved by Rio de Janeiro’s municipal secretary of education and has the support of the Chinese Consulate General in the city, China’s official Xinhua News Agency said today.

The Confucius Institute of the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro provided Mandarin textbooks in Portuguese and, after the start of the project, will regularly send teachers to the three schools to train and support local teachers.

The launch took place on Wednesday at the headquarters of the Chinese Cultural Association in Rio de Janeiro, in the presence of the general manager of the Brazilian subsidiary of the Chinese state oil company China National Offshore Oil Corporation, sponsor of the pilot project.

Huang Yehua said he hoped “more and more young Brazilians will appreciate, learn, master and use Mandarin, becoming ambassadors for the development of China-Brazilian friendship when they grow up.”

In December 2021, a group of 89 Brazilian universities signed an agreement to launch a Mandarin teaching project, with the Chinese government agency responsible for the Confucius Institute.

The executive director of the Group for International Cooperation of Brazilian Universities, Rossana Silva, said the group wants to invest in Mandarin education so that it can cooperate with Chinese universities and companies in various fields.

The Center for Chinese and Foreign Language Exchange and Cooperation, under the Chinese Ministry of Education, operates the Confucius Institute, which establishes offices directly in overseas schools and university campuses.

In Portugal, the institute guarantees free Mandarin lessons in five Portuguese universities – Porto, Aveiro, Coimbra, Lisbon and Minho.

The Confucius Institute also has offices in several universities in Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, the University of São Tomé and Príncipe and the University of Cape Verde.

In April 2021, 21 US Congressmen and Senators accused Confucius Institute delegations in the United States of America of pressuring teaching staff to avoid topics that could be negative for the interests of the regime. Chinese.

Other countries have severed their ties with the Confucius Institute, including Canada, Australia and Sweden.