Beijing, Dec 25 (IANS): In a move aimed at encouraging students to take care of their health and ensure robustness, the Chinese government will carry out a nationwide fitness monitoring of school children from next year onwards.

According to Minister for Education Yuan Guiren, the monitoring will be conducted from 2013 by a third-party institution and its result will be released to the students' parents timely.

Speaking at a meeting on sports work in schools, the minister said, sports work concerns children's physical and mental health, and their lifetime happiness.

He said the schools must guarantee the class hours of physical education (PE), and should not occupy classes for it with any excuses.

For schools and regions where students' health keeps declining for consecutive three years, they will undoubtedly be vetoed in evaluation of educational qualities, said Yuan.

To promote physical education in schools, China has tried a series of measures in recent years. However, the school children's health remains a cause of concern.

Official statistics show overweight and poor eyesight have become apparent problems among school children in China. About 67 percent of the students aged between 13 and 15 and 79 percent of students aged between 19 to 22 have vision deficiency.