Russia to increase intake of foreign students by 30 percent from this year

The government of Russia is planning to raise the intake of foreign students studying at its higher educational institutions by 30 percent from this year, raising their number up to 200,000.

Lyudmila Ogorodova, Russia’s deputy minister of education and science, who is in-charge of implementing the plan, clarified the same.

Going ahead, the government said it may expand further the foreign student cap in the next few years.

Ogorodova was quoted by University World News as saying that they gave their assent to a proposal to increase the cap for overseas students this year and added that Russian universities were currently equipped to admit many more foreign students.

He added that investments made by the country in improving infrastructure in recent years at universities, particularly in science and education, have enabled them to come up with English language programmes and to empower English-speaking teachers.

It has also been planned to make 20,000 seats out of the total 200,000 state-funded.

The Ministry of Education and Science of Russia said that biotechnology and medicine are currently the most sought after disciplines by foreign students at the universities of the world’s largest country.

According to a ministry spokesperson, unlike earlier, when most students came to Russia from the former Soviet member states, there was a significant rise in demand to study there in recent years from nationals of Latin America and Southeast Asia.

In addition, the Ministry of Education and Science said that it had plans to ease the visa restrictions for international students wanting to enrol in Russia.

Included in the most popular educational institutions in Russia are the National Research University Higher School of Economics, Saint Petersburg State University, Moscow State University and the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia.

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