MALAYSIA: Identifying number of universities needed

The Malaysian government is conducting a study to find out the total number of universities - public and private - needed by the country in order to produce the desired number of graduates. Higher Education Minister Datuk Seri Khaled Nordin said the purpose of the study was to maintain the quality of Malaysian universities and strengthen the higher education sector, writes Husna Yusop for The Sun Daily.

At the same time, any decision to build new universities or foreign university branch campuses in Malaysia should benefit the country by producing human capital and contributing towards economic growth. "We do not want every Tom, Dick and Harry branch university campus to be set up in this country, offering programmes which may not be relevant to our country," he told reporters at the ministry.

The ministry's plan is to enrol 150,000 international students in Malaysia by 2015, and 200,000 by 2020. As at April, the figure stood at about 86,000 students.
Full report on The Sun Daily site