Home China Headline Only half of China speaks Mandarin

Only half of China speaks Mandarin

Only about half of China's 1.3 billion people can speak the national language, Mandarin, despite it being the official medium of education, Xinhua news agency said on Wednesday. More men spoke Mandarin than women, and only 45 per cent of rural residents could "effectively communicate orally" in the language, Xinhua said, citing a report by the Ministry of Education. But two-thirds of urban dwellers and people aged between 15 and 29 were fluent, the survey found, after canvassing 500,000 people around the country. Only around 30 per cent of those aged between 60 and 69 were able to speak it, the survey found. A senior Chinese education official told Reuters last year that the country was too large and had too few resources to get all its people speaking Mandarin. China refers to Mandarin as "Putonghua", or "common speech", while in Taiwan it is called "Guoyu", or "national language". Trackback(0) TrackBack URI for this entry Comments (0) Subscribe to this comment's feed Show/Hide comments Write comment Show/Hide comment form Name Email Website Title Comment Write the displayed characters Add Comment Copyright 2007. All Rights Reserved.

 

< Prev		Next >