Around 55,000 Chinese have married foreigners or other Chinese based in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs (MCA).

The MCA has noted a 12% rise in such marriages last year compared to the number it had recorded three years ago, China.org reported.

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The ministry did not release details about the Chinese gender proportion in the registered marriages. The ages and place of origin of the foreign spouses were also not revealed. The MCA said around 13.4 million citizens from mainland China married in 2013.

According to Professor Sun Xiaomei, a marriage and women's studies specialist at China Women's University in Beijing, the actual number of Chinese citizens marrying foreigners could turn out to be much higher than the one reported. China's government does not know how many Chinese have registered their marriages abroad.

Meanwhile, marriage specialist Zhou Xiaopeng identified two major reasons for the increasing number of Chinese citizens marrying foreign residents. One is foreigners' less prejudice for appearance and age, and the other is the gender ratio imbalance in China.

Zhou, who works for dating site baihe.com, said foreigners "care less" about physical traits and age compared with local Chinese men. She explained that more and more educated Chinese women prefer to date and marry Westerners.

Because of the imbalanced gender ratio in China, there are more single men in the country, Zhou said. Based on the most recent national census figures, China has a wide gender gap especially in the remote or more undeveloped areas, with 118 male born for every 100 female babies.

Meanwhile, media firms have reported that more men from China's rural regions are buying their brides from other countries in the last few years, Zhou added. These men purchase seek the services of illegal agencies to purchase brides from Southeast Asian countries such as Vietnam. 

Tagsmarriage, foreigners, gender gap, spouse