THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Fifteen years after Hong Kong was handed back to China, Mandarin has finally overtaken English as the island’s second most widely spoken language.
According to census figures released this week, 48 per cent of Hong Kong residents can speak Mandarin, compared to 46 per cent who can speak English. Cantonese remains the island’s dialect of choice, with 96 per cent of the population able to speak it.
While the proportion of English speakers has risen slightly since a census in 2001, the spread of Chinese has been far more rapid: ten years ago, only just over a third of the population could speak Mandarin. » | Malcolm Moore, Beijing | Friday, February 24, 2012
