The Chinese people's English proficiency will no longer be put to the test whenever they apply for a job promotion.

This developed, as the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China issued a new policy which no longer required Chinese professionals to pass an English language test in order to move up the corporate ladder, according to a report by the China Daily.

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The new policy, aimed at breaking down barriers in evaluating and promoting talented professionals, was released before the start of the latest annual English test that was scheduled on Saturday.

The announcement of the policy may have been timely, as the large number of individuals who had signed up to take the Chinese English proficiency test did not show up at the examination halls.

In fact, in Sichuan province alone, over 10,000 people, or 17 percent of those who were registered to take the exam, ended up not taking the for still unknown reasons test.

Introduced in the 1990s, passing the English literacy test served as a key requirement for professional and technical workers who wanted to move up to higher positions in their organizations.

The Chinese government's main goal then was to encourage its people to study and learn the English language to enable them to participate in more international cooperation and exchanges.

Included in the list of professionals who were required to take the exams were college teachers, researchers, translators, accountants, lawyers, news reporters and editors.

Yu Hao, a teacher at New Oriental Education & Technology Group who trained people to pass the Chinese English proficiency test, shared that the exam became a burden to many, especially for those whose positions did not need the use of English language skills.

"Many of my students were in their 40s or 50s and didn't have the ability or opportunity to learn English when they were young," said.

"They are excellent and rich in experience relevant to their professions, but they are unable to get higher titles, only because they didn't pass this exam," added Yu who has worked as an English language trainer for the past nine years. 

As a measure of the Chinese English proficiency test's success, about one-sixth of the 500 students he had trained yearly would return to his classroom the following year after failing the exam.

TagsChinese English Proficiency, English language, Communist Party of China (CPC)