The Chinese Proficiency Test (HSK) witnessed a spike in the number of examinees in 2005.

Around 117,600 foreigners took the test worldwide, an increase of more than 26 percent on 2004.

"The growing number of entrants indicates that China plays an increasingly important role in the world and is involved in more and more international trading," said a spokeswoman from the Department of Testing Affairs (HSK) of National Office for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language.

"Among the examinees, people from the Republic of Korea account for large proportion," she said.

But she did not impart the actual figure.

HSK is the acronym of pinyin for Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi, meaning Chinese Proficiency Test in English.

As a national-level Chinese test for people whose mother tongue is not Chinese, the HSK was launched in 1990 in China and was promoted overseas the following year.

The centre also revealed that as the participation is increasing, so is the number of fake certificates that are discovered.

To prevent cheating, the centre will establish a comprehensive database of the examination results and certificates.

The website of HSK (http://www.hsk.org.cn) has also been updated recently including two more services, registration and results confirmation.

The HSK Centre promised to upload the results of examinations as soon as possible for the convenience of the examinees across the world.

There are now 35 cities in China and 37 countries with HSK examination centres.

By the end of 2005, there were more than 500,000 foreigners and 500,000 ethnic Chinese who had taken the exam since it started in 1990, according to reports of Xinhua News Agency.

(China.org.cn, China Daily January 17, 2006)