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The Administration will encourage tertiary institutions to build on their existing strengths by developing centres of excellence, says the Chief Executive, Mr Tung Chee Hwa.

"This will help ensure that they keep pace with rising international standards so as to serve better Hong Kong's future economic and social needs.

"To remain competitive, we must be skilful and versatile and our higher education system has to reflect this need," he said in his Policy Address today (Wednesday).

The tertiary sector's decision to offer places to students who excelled in areas other than pure academic performance sent a clear signal that our society valued attributes such as athletic or artistic talent, he said.

"We will look to this arrangement becoming a regular feature of the admission system.

"To enhance our status as a regional centre for higher education, it is our policy to admit non-local students to our higher education programmes," Mr Tung said.

Starting from the 1999-2000 academic year, the overall quota of a maximum of 580 first-year, non-local undergraduate students will include 150 outstanding Mainland students.

The admission of non-local students facilitated the cross-fertilisation of skills and ideas, injected an element of healthy competition for local students and broadened students' outlook.

On life-long learning, Mr Tung said that as the society became more knowledge-based, continued education became more than just the preserve of keen learners.

"It plays an important part in helping us the make progress in society.

"I look to Hong Kong developing further as a learning-based community.

"I encourage the Open University and other institutes also to provide continuous learning facilities for our community's benefits," he said.

Mr Tung pledged that the Administration would do its best to let everyone have a chance to upgrade their skills if they so wished.

End/Wednesday. October 7, 1998

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