This year marks the fifth anniversary of the launch of Lancang-Mekong Cooperation. The first Lancang-Mekong Youth Exchange Forum for School-Place Cooperation was held in Fudan University in Shanghai on March 26, 2021. The Lancang-Mekong Youth Online was launched at the forum.

In March 2016, the leaders of China, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam attended the first LMC Leaders' Meeting in Sanya, Hainan province, marking the full launch of the LMC process. Leaders of the six countries attached great importance to and give priority to exchanges and cooperation in the fields of education and youth. Over the past five years, with the concerted efforts and participation of all parties, higher education and people-to-people exchanges have become an vital part and content of the LMC mechanism.

The Lancang-Mekong Youth Exchange and Cooperation Center was officially established on July 22, 2019, with its secretariat located at Fudan University. It is committed to building an international platform for people-to-people exchanges, youth development and higher education cooperation in the region, and serving the exchanges, cooperation and common development of universities and youth in countries along the rivers in a full range.

The online platform, launched on the same day, is a comprehensive platform integrating communication, online learning and event management. The custom-developed platform allows teachers and students from the six countries to communicate, study online, conduct courses and even hold competitions on mobile phones and computers.

Since its inception, the Lancang-Mekong Youth Exchange and Cooperation Center has focused on the actual needs of the sustainable development of the youth of the countries along the rivers, and worked within the framework of the LMC mechanism to effectively build a functional platform for multilateral and bilateral cooperation. Starting from 2020, the Center invites universities from all over the world to jointly design and implement the Lancang-Mekong Youth Innovation and Development Three-Year Action (2020-2022), which mainly includes innovation and entrepreneurship education, international community practice, innovative talent training and wisdom sharing, so as to elevate youth exchanges to a new height through practical cooperation.

On the same day, the Center and the Lancang-Mekong Youth Practice Base were inaugurated. Special guests participated in the event and respectively delivered keynote speeches, including Yang Jian, former deputy director-general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China in Asia and former ambassador to Brunei, as well as Liu Junguo, an academician of Academia Europaea and professor at the Southern University of Science and Technology.