The latest statistics from the Ministry of Education show that 17 percent of Chinese youths of college age entered institutions of higher learning last year, twopercentage points higher than that of 2002.

The enrollment of China's institutions of higher learning has been expanding gradually over recent years, with the recruited number of students increasing to 3.4 million in 2002 from 1.08 million in 1998.

In 2003, a total of 3.8217 million students entered universities or colleges, a rise of 19.24 percent year on year. The total number of students on campus was 11.0856 million last year, up 22.72 percent over 2002.

China had 1,552 institutions of higher learning in 2003, and there were 720 institutions offering graduate degrees.

The number of graduate students was 651,300 in China last year.