As the Belt and Road Initiative gains greater traction worldwide, a major report has shown how the massive international development project is slowly capturing the imagination of international media and public alike. 

Foreign media and netizens have been paying more  attention to the initiative, according to the Belt and Road Big Data Report 2017 published by the State Information Center. For instance, in 2015, when China issued its Vision and Actions document on Jointly Building the Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road, there was a notable increase in support for the project. 

This was the case once again in May of last year, when China hosted the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation. Based on a survey, the support rate for the initiative has risen from 16.5 percent in 2013 to about 23 percent last year. 

The report also reveals that people in countries such as the US, India, Britain, Russia and Australia are the ones most interested in the initiative, while it's also catching on quickly in the likes of Italy, Thailand, Turkey and Pakistan.