The signing ceremony of the Silk Road Architecture and Technology Publishing Cluster was held at the grand opening ceremony of the 2025 Conference of the SRIAATU, which was held at the Yanta Campus of Xi’an University of Architecture and Technology (XAUAT) on the afternoon of May 14. The cluster aims to build an academic community, share China’s solutions and jointly establish industry standards.
On the morning of May 15, a workshop on building global partnership in architecture and technology publishing was held with the aim of gaining insights about more feasible paths in international publishing cooperation. The participants focused on topics such as areas of cooperation, transformation of scientific and technological achievements, language and communication, cooperation mechanism and the key role of universities in this field.
Representatives from the Editorial Office of XAUAT Journal, Palestine’s An-Najah National University, Belarus’ Sukhoi State Technical University of Gomel, IWA Publishing and China Architecture Publishing & Media Co., Ltd. Attended the workshop. Professor Li Zhihua, Vice Director of XAUAT International Relations Office, chaired the workshop. Professor Wang Xiaochang, coordinator of the workshop, guided the discussion.
Ouyang Dong, Deputy General Manager of China Architecture Publishing & Media Co., Ltd, highlighted the role of the company as the publisher with the most comprehensive coverage and the largest volume in the field of architecture both in China and abroad. He hoped to establish cooperation with foreign universities, research institutions and publishers to facilitate two-way cultural exchanges by promoting China’s standards and new achievements in architectural technology to the world and introducing cutting-edge research achievements from abroad.
Abdelhaleem Khader from An-Najah National University said, more support is needed for an open access to platforms as there are problems of publishing being hindered and difficulty in connecting to international journals. Professor Muhannad Haj Hussein from An-Najah National University, who is also an architect, said textbooks were limited in the past and hoped to introduce professional books from China and other countries in fields of green building and water conservancy projects.
Grigoriy V. Piyatrishin, Vice Rector of Sukhoi State Technical University of Gomel, said that there are pressure of publishing cost and problems of language barriers, and hoped to find low-cost channels and enhance dissemination through language transfer.
Cheng Guangping, Vice Director of the Editorial Office of XAUAT Journal, hoped to work with other publishers in promoting China’s achievements to the international academic community.
Arash Hejazi, Managing Director of IWA Publishing, and Professor Wang Xiaochang hoped to introduce China’s achievements in architecture into international practice in engineering through cooperation in translation, joint publishing and special issues, while promoting the connection between journals such as Water Research and China’s academic resources.
The relevant universities and publishers reached a consensus at the workshop that they will focus on implementing the objectives of the publishing cluster, enhance the international visibility of achievements through building a joint publishing platform, translating textbooks and monographs, launching special issues and cooperating on the results of the conference. Pilot projects and a cooperation alliance will also be launched to promote the global flow of architectural achievements and inject new impetus into the sustainable development of the industry.
