Chinese President Hu Jintao, addressing the ongoing summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) here on Thursday, called on SCO members to expand cultural and educational cooperation and facilitate youth exchanges, Xinhua reported.

In the address, Hu proposed that SCO members learn from one another and promote equal exchanges between different cultures so as to consolidate the social basis for the generations-long friendship between SCO members.

The Chinese president said half of the world’s population, which covers more than 300 ethnic groups, lives in SCO member and observer countries and has created splendid and age-old cultures in history.

"We should learn from one another’s advanced aspects to overcome our shortcomings and make common progress," he said.

SCO member countries should engage in all-around exchanges and cooperation in such fields as science, culture, education, sports and healthcare, and make special efforts to create conditions for the exchanges between their youths, Hu said.

Apart from other scholarship programs set up under bilateral agreements, China will establish a separate scholarship project to sponsor 20 students from its five fellow SCO members -- Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, to study in China every year.

The Chinese president also suggested that SCO members take turns hosting exchange workshops for young students. To implement the initiative, China will invite more than 50 undergraduates and middle school students to come to south China’s tropic resort Hainan Island next year to spend their winter holidays, Hu said.

He hoped SCO members would actively promote the teaching of one another’s language and cultures, and said China will provide more teachers and text books for the teaching of Chinese in other SCO members and hoped that Chinese teachers and students will get due support for the teaching and learning of Russian, Kazakh, Kirghiz, Tajiki and Uzbek.

As China is going to host the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in its capital city Beijing, Hu welcomed SCO members to take part in Olympics-related cultural events and vowed to provide convenience for them to show their cultures during the Olympic Games.