Minister of Education Zhou Ji said Thursday that it is possible for China to increase spending on education to 4 percent of GDP by 2007.

Zhou made the remark at a press conference sponsored by the State Council Information Office in Beijing on March 24. He also introduced the latest phase of the 2003 - 2007 Action Plan for Invigorating Education.

China’s Education Law requires that government funding of education grow at a faster rate than government revenue at the same level.

“We emphasize that this growth rate should not only be listed in the budget, but should also appear in the bottom line,” said the minister, adding that this is a new approach taken by the Ministry of Education for effective implementation of the action plan.

Since China’s economy will continue to develop rapidly in the next few years, Zhou is confident that the goal of expanding educational funding to 4 percent of GDP can be realized within the term of office of the current government.

The central and local governments increased spending on education during the 1998 - 2002 period as part of the previous phase of the action plan. Each level of government was encouraged to raise by one percentage point the proportion of spending on education to GDP. Overall, the figure rose from 2.5 percent to 3.4 percent in that period.

“Of course, this is far from enough if we give priority to developing education,” said the minister. “Accordingly the central government has called for greater effort and more money flowing into education.”

In carrying out the current phase of the action plan, the most recent increase in funding from the Ministry of Education will mainly go to rural areas to strengthen compulsory education. Other types of education should maintain their development momentum.

“To this end, we hope the government will increase spending and we encourage various social sources to invest in educational undertakings,” said Zhou.

(China.org.cn by Chen Qiuping, March 25, 2004)