A student team from the University of Macau (UM) recently won the championship at the Fourth Macau Model European Union (EU). This is the second consecutive year that UM students have won a championship at Macao’s Model EU. Co-organised by the European Union Academic Programme in Macao (EUAP-M) and UM’s Youth Association of International Affairs (YAIA), this year’s event attracted 56 students of nine nationalities from six higher education institutions in Macao. 

The topic of this year’s Model EU was the exit of the United Kingdom from the EU. Participants discussed current issues in Europe from the perspective of heads of states and governments in a simulated European Council meeting. Participants demonstrated a deep understanding of the functions of the EU and the positions of the countries they represented. At the end of the two-day discussion, students reached a consensus on many topics, including the necessity of the free movement of goods, services, persons, and capital as preconditions for the European Single Market, and a proposal for the establishment of a transition period of a minimum of three years after the conclusion of the negotiations between the EU and the United Kingdom.

The team formed by UM students He Wenting and Fu Qiuming won a Best Team Award, while Evelin Rizzo, an exchange student from Italy, won the Best Individual Participant Award. Next summer, they will be awarded free study trips to Europe funded by EUAP-M. The team formed by UM students Lin Sijie and Xiao Shiling, and the team formed by UM students Esther Li and Li Xinwei, received a second prize and a third prize, respectively, in the group category. UM students Dorji Wangchuk and Yao Fangyuan won a second prize and a third prize, respectively, in the individual category. The team formed by UM students Hoi Keng Ieong and Haiyu Wang won the Best Position Paper Award.

The 56 participants in this year’s Macau Model EU were selected from 120 applicants from UM, Macao Polytechnic Institute, the Macau University of Science and Technology, the Institute for Tourism Studies, the University of Saint Joseph, and the City University of Macau.

Established in 2012, the EUAP-M is a partnership between UM and the Institute of European Studies of Macau and is co-financed by the EU. It aims to help Macao's general public, particularly students, better understand the EU.