中國力求2020年前讓80%的人口講普通話
China has said that it wants 80% of its citizens to speak Mandarin, the country's dominant dialect, by 2020.
中國政府於日前表示，希望在2020年前讓80%的中國公民能夠講占主導地位的方言--普通話。The current figure of 70% leaves hundreds of millions of people speaking other languages.
目前普通話使用者的比例是70%，因此仍有幾億人在使用其他語言。China has numerous local dialects and the government wants to close the gap between different regions and groups of people.
中國存在着大量的地方方言，政府希望可以縮小不同地區和不同人羣之間的差異。
In some cases the residents of one rural village may be unable to understand the locals living just two villages away, correspondents say.
有時候，某個村子裏的村民可能都聽不懂隔兩個村莊以外的人們說的方言。
The Chinese government wants to remedy this, admitting that despite the majority of people in large cities understanding the language, only 40% of people in some parts of China are able to speak the national dialect.
中國政府希望改變目前的這一狀況，承認儘管在大城市的大部分人都明白普通話，但在國內的某些地方，只有40%的人能夠講普通話。It also wants to improve Mandarin speaking among teachers, especially those from ethnic minority regions.
此外，中國還希望提高教師講普通話的能力，特別是在少數民族地區的教師。The Chinese authorities said that they would ensure that all new teachers passed a standard Mandarin speaking test, adding that online remote teaching would also be used to ensure teachers of different Chinese ethnicities were able to learn.
中國當局表示，希望能保證所有的新教師都通過標準普通話水平測試，而網絡遠程教學也能用來保證不同民族的教師有條件去學習普通話。China is the world's most populous nation with 1.35 billion people living in the country, which covers an area of 9.6 million sq km (3.7 million sq miles).
中國目前約有13.5億人，是世界上人口最多的國家，分佈在960萬平方公里（370萬平方英里）的廣闊大地上。
