The Communist Party of China (CPC) saw its provincial-level leaders younger and better educated on average after a reshuffle that also cut the number of deputy Party chiefs by more than a half.

Currently, Party chiefs of China's 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities aged about 58 on average, the Beijing News reported on Sunday.

Twelve of the provincial party chiefs, or 39 percent, were born in the 1950s, and they are becoming the backbone of the Party's local leadership, the report said.

More younger members, some even in their forties, have joined the provincial Party leadership after the reshuffle, Li Min, a professor with the Party School of the CPC Central Committee, was quoted as saying.

Zhao Leji, 50, secretary of the CPC Shaanxi Provincial Committee, is now the youngest provincial Party boss in China.

But it doesn't mean the Party only focuses its eyes on younger officials. Actually, most of the provincial Party committees are composed of members of three different age groups, some in early forties, some above fifties and some around sixties, Li said.

Though having more younger faces, local Party leadership has a reasonable combination in terms of both age and governing capacity, Li said.

Nearly half of the current provincial Party chiefs have master's or doctor's degrees, said the report.

As a typical example, Wang Min, the newly elected secretary of the CPC Jilin Provincial Committee, achieved a doctor's degree in the Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

It's now an era demanding knowledge on management, economics and even the Internet, which has impelled the Party to absorb more better-educated officials, Li said.

Meanwhile, the number of deputy chiefs of the provincial Party committees was trimmed from 158 to 67 after the reshuffle.

It can help improve efficiency and strengthen ruling capacity, Li said.

Reshuffles of the Party's provincial leadership started in October last year. East China's Shandong Province, which finished the Party's internal election on June 28, was the last to stage new provincial leaders.

The local elections occur every five years.

(Xinhua News Agency July 2, 2007)