More female students who study abroad are returning to China Updated: 2016-03-28 13:55 (Ecns.c)

More Chinese students are returning home after studying overseas, largely because of the difficulty in finding a suitable partner, the Yangcheng Evening News reported on Sunday.

Of those who return, nearly 60 percent are women.

China's Ministry of Education released a report saying that 79.87 percent of Chinese students studying abroad chose to return to China to continue their careers in 2014.

Statistics show that 59.16 percent of female overseas returnees come home after finishing their studies, surpassing the number of their male counterparts.

The reason is mainly because it is relatively difficult to find a marriage partner in a foreign country.

Blind dates have become increasingly popular among overseas returnees, and job fairs this spring season plan to organize match-making events with dating agencies to help returnees, the report said.

The number of students coming home to work has risen sharply in recent years due to the unprecedented opportunities and favorable development environment in China, said Qi Mo, director of the Overseas Returnee Department at the Ministry of Education Service Center.

Furthermore, the report shows that for Chinese overseas students abroad, Britain, America, Australia, Korea, Japan, France, and Germany are the top destinations.

More and more Chinese students are choosing the U.S. for doctorate degrees in engineering and medical science, which require highly technical knowledge; meanwhile other overseas students prefer to go to Britain for masters degrees in economics and management, it was added.

In addition, 49.34 percent of overseas returnees choose to work in first-tier cities, namely Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen, a decrease of eight percent compared with the previous year.

As job markets tighten in eastern cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, recent graduates have already begun looking towards second and third tier cities for employment, where comparatively low salaries are offset by a lower cost of living.

Overseas returnees entering the job market this year are distressed by low salaries, where the salaries of graduates with doctorate degrees average around 5,000 yuan ($767) to 10,000 yuan a month; and nearly 50 percent of students with masters degrees earns less than 5,000 yuan, according to the report.