From October 1, China will be rolling out K Visas to attract talent from across the globe, and its timing appears to be just right coming out as it did with its new travel document plan after US President Donald Trump made American visas tougher to get, and more expensive.
Trump’s move to charge USD 100,000 fees for every H1B Visa makes it somewhat prohibitive for American companies to hire foreigners, and this move is being seen with nervousness by Indians. But experts feel that the US decision could turn out a self goal, and few are hoping that US courts may step in to halt it.
But, already, China has begun courting science, technology and engineering professionals and experts expect other countries too, like Russia after its war with Ukraine is over could be another destination for talent. For the present, China is making its Visa processes easy with an aim to attract talent in research, entrepreneurship and for academic and scientific collaborations.
Strategic analyst specialising on China, and emerging economies, Atul Aneja told News24 that the “K Visa actually represents geo political, geo economic and even geo cultural shift. If you look at Geo political shift, it is apparent that it is the BRICS plus which are merging as the drivers of the global system. It is a multi polar world and BRICS are representing this multi polar world from the geo political side. Geo economics side, the same trend is coming in. China is already the world’s No 2 economy, and by 2049 when it completes 100 years that is the PRC, it wants to be the leading economic power and leaders in scientific, cultural and other domains.”
So it ( K Visa) is all a preparation for achieving this second centenary goal of the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. It os their stated policy direction and it is moving in that direction, he said.
“What I think has happened with the effective restrictions, if not actual denial, of H1B Visa by United States, China through its K Visa is opening its doors to international talent, to achieve that major objective,” Aneja said.
Earlier too, China had its Thousand Talents Plan, in 2008 when it attracted experts in science, technology and other fields to china to accelerate its economic development, amid concerns of the US and the Western World of theft of intellectual property and allegations of espionage.
“From an Indian perspective, it may be high time to look at Chinese IT hub, Hangzhou, where a new ‘Silicon valley’ is developing. And finally it is not just China that will gain, look at Russia, it is going to be a major arena where you are going to have migration of talent, once its war with Ukraine is over. Already our exports to Russia have begun to go up, and if you look at Aeroflot flight in Delhi in the morning, 30 percent of it flight is blue collared labour. But white collar will come as Russia continues to grow,” he said.
“And finally it is going to be India, but only if it gets act together as it has talent that needs to be deployed. India needs to build an ecosystem for the home grown talent to want to stay at home,” Aneja added.
But for Indians to migrate to China, the cultural factors will always be a limiting factor in taking such decisions said Ganapathi Ramachandran, former SICCI President and Chennai-based IT entrepreneur with global operations. “Past hostilities will be in the front and centre of taking such decision making, I still think India migration will happen to east European countries, say like Croatia and others that are setting up near shore centres, as we call them. Language skills are definitely better there,” Ramachandran said.
Even the world will wait for Chinese offer to play out, because of various factors, including the known absence of democracy there, the dietary habits, culture and definitely language limitations, he said.
The feeling of being an alien will always be a limiting factor in adopting this particular K Visa and migrate to China, Ramachandran said.
Manav Jain, Chief Business Officer, OnGrid, a leading digital background verification platform, told News24 that the Chinese K Visa underscores the global competition for a skilled workforce. For Indian professionals, especially in technology and STEM, this presents new avenues, but it also highlights an equally important need — building trust in cross-border workforce mobility.
“Employers and governments must be confident about who they are hiring, which makes robust background verification and identity validation critical. OnGrid, as India’s leading digital trust platform specialising in background verification, believes scalable, tech-driven verification solutions will play a pivotal role in enabling this shift,” Jain said.
“The K visa may change migration flows, but the real differentiator will be the ability to create a trusted ecosystem where mobility, compliance, and opportunity go hand in hand,” he added.
