A member of the Zhidan junior football team takes part in a football game in Zhidan in Yan'an, Shaanxi province, May 6, 2014. [Hao Yan/chinadaily.com.cn]

Rainbow Bridge Project

The Rainbow Bridge Project, initiated by the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, leverages the organizational experience and support of multinational corporations to support young people from China's less developed areas.

VW Group China initiated the vocational education project while considering the junior football team project in October last year.

"I saw students using two outdated engines to learn car maintenance and repairing. Those engines are not in line with the country's national IV standard." said Yang.

The country's new cars made, imported or sold after July 1 2013 must meet the National IV emission standard. Using old engines would have meant that the students would have learnt outdated technology, which would have been useless in handling the national IV engines in practical terms after graduation.

At that moment, Yang thought of arranging advanced engines for the training.

She contacted seven plants and all gave positive response. Exceeding her expectations, the plants extended their support to workbenches and technical support engineers to ensure that the students acquired the skills comprehensively.

"The next step is to invite eight instructors to our plants in the summer, so they can master the latest techniques," said Yang. The effort is to close the gap between the practical demands of the market and the vocational education imparted through lectures.

With a financial commitment of 1.5 million yuan, Volkswagen contributes by providing junior football training, sports equipment and clothing, including vocational training and technical equipment for educational purposes, to students.

In March, VW Group and the Rainbow Bridge Project took the Chinese Zhidan and Hong'an junior football team to Germany, for training with coaches from VfL Wolfsburg and a friendship match in Berlin against the U13 team of German Bundesliga. It helped Chinese young people from less developed areas realize their football dreams.

"Volkswagen's support of the Rainbow Bridge Project will provide opportunities for future generations of China from economically less developed areas to fulfill their football dreams and learn what it means to be trained by professional coaches, such as those by VfL Wolfsburg," Volkswagen Group China President & CEO Jochem Heizmann said earlier.

Sustainable mobility

Over the past three decades, VW Group has been committed to China's auto industry and Chinese society by comprehensively performing its corporate social responsibilities in sustainable mobility, clean environment and taking care of people.

Volkswagen's corporate social responsibility programs, such as the 'Green Future' environmental education initiative, the 'Volkswagen Safety Road' video series, and the 'Volkswagen Group Child Safety Initiative', have strongly supported the sustainable development of Chinese society.

The company will partner with SAIC Motor Corp and First Automotive Works (FAW) Group to develop and begin production of new-energy vehicles in its largest market from 2016. Shanghai Volkswagen will further develop eco-friendly models and a joint research project, while FAW-VW will develop and manufacture a new, very eco-friendly vehicle in China.

The projects are part of 18.2 billion euros ($25.1 billion) in investment for new plants and products that Volkswagen and its partners are making between 2014 and 2018. It will be the largest-ever investment in China's automotive industry.

This year Volkswagen will import electric up!, e-golf and Audi A3 e-tron models.

"The import of hybrid models will follow in 2016 and then we will start to locally produce the plug-in hybrids under MQB and MLB shared modular construction platforms in China," said Heizmann.