China Hopes MQA Will Recognise 800 Higher Institutions

KUALA LUMPUR, March 16 (Bernama) -- The Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China hopes the Malaysian Qualifications Agency (MQA) will recognise a further list of 800 higher learning institutions, which is still awaiting approval. China's ambssador to Malaysia, Chai Xi said China was grateful to the Ministry of Higher Education of Malaysia (MOHE) and MQA which accepted and accredited a total of 146 higher institutions in China after the Malaysian and Chinese governments signed a Mutual Recognition Agreement (MRA) in higher education on April 28, 2011. MQA had been appointed by the ministry as the Designated Body to represent Malaysia in implementing the MRA. "Hopefully Malaysia will recognise the 800 higher learning institutions which are still yet to get the accredition and be accepted by MOHE and MQA," he told a press conference his official residence here, Thursday. As for the Chinese education authorities, they had no difficulty in approving a list of 54 Malaysian public and private higher institutions which had been submitted for accredition and gave assurance that it will be recognised by this year (2012), Chai said. "To date, there are a total of 10,000 Chinese students currently studying in Malaysia while about 3,000 Malaysian students and 300,000 foreign students from around the world are studying in China now," he said. Chai said all the programmes offered by the higher learning institutions in China were conducted in the Chinese language except for Masters Degree and other higher programmes. Students who are not fluent in the language will need to attend Chinese language courses between eight months to one year, he said. Meanwhile, on Malaysia-China relations, Chai said both countries were good neighbours and established an excellent diplomatic relationship and relations currently were at the best period in history, among others because frequent high-level meeting and exchanges between leaders of both countries. In recognising youth as future leaders, Chai said China and Malaysia would jointly organise Youth Exchange Visits for 100 delegates from each side. -- BERNAMA