Chinese school children are being encouraged to take more after-class recreational and sports activities to guarantee their health and widen their horizons.

A decade-long project to promote physical education after lessons among primary and middle school students was launched over the weekend in Zhengzhou, capital of Central China's Henan Province.

The campaign is also aimed at introducing more healthy, interesting and science-added recreational activities into schools.

It is being masterminded by the Ministry of Education, State Sport General Administration, Central Committee of the Communist Youth League of China and the National Working Committee on Children and Teenagers.

The project will cover more than 200 million students from more than 600,000 primary and middle schools across China, said Wang Zhan, vice-minister of education.

As well as academic study, children and young people need to do recreational and sports activities in school for an all-round and healthy development, Wang said.

A lack of sports activities has meant Chinese school children's physical attributes have declined during the past few years, Wang said.

A recent survey revealed 10 per cent of Chinese male school children between seven and eight are overweight.

A basic physical index of children and teenagers today has shown that muscle strength, endurance and pliability are much lower than those of youths in 1985 and 1995.

Recreational and sports activity demonstration bases will be set up in every province, autonomous region and municipality in the near future, according to Wang.

The first batch of recreational and sports activity demonstration bases were launched over the weekend, including two in Beijing Municipality and one in each of Jiangsu, Shandong and Henan provinces.

(China Daily November 20, 2001)