Learning Mandarin increasingly popular in the United Kingdom

An increasing number of British people are realizing that mastering the Chinese language is no longer only a skill out of personal interest, but more importantly, a way to enhance one's competence in the job market.

The British government says the number of people studying Chinese is expected to hit 400,000 by 2020.

Currently, there are 29 Confucius Institutes and 148 Confucius Classrooms in the United Kingdom, one of the most in Europe. More than 160,000 people have studied in the institutes and classrooms.

The number of people taking the HSK, a Chinese language level standardized test for foreigners organized by China, has been continuously increasing over recent years.

It is believed that the increase in China's influence and national power, especially the fast development of China-UK economic and trade ties after the Belt and Road Initiative was proposed in 2013, plays an important role in heating up the Chinese language learning wave.

The Department for Education of the UK launched a Mandarin excellence program in September last year, investing £10 million (US$13 million) to cultivate at least 5,000 middle school students to be fluent in Chinese, as well providing for 100 Chinese language teachers.

Statistics show 45 percent of private schools in the UK have opened courses for Chinese languages. More and more people are regarding Mandarin as their second language in the UK.