“38,000 foreigners are studying various majors in universities all over Iran,” said Abdolhamid Alizadeh, secretary general of Students Affairs Organization of Iran on Monday.
The figure is much bigger than the 34.000-foreign-students quota the Iranian government had foreseen for the four-year period of 2018-2022, according to the official.
Under Iran's Sixth Development Plan (2018-2022), Higher Education Ministry has been obliged to have 34,000 foreign students, that is 1% of all Iranian university student population, in the second year (2019).
There are 3,400,000 Iranians studying at universities across the country.
In this central Iran province only, 470 foreigners out of the total 38,000 non-Iranian students are currently enrolled in universities across the capital city of Yazd.
Students from Iraq, Afghanistan, Brunei and Malaysia comprise the majority of foreigners who are studying in Yazd universities.
Yazd University Rector Mohammad Saleh Owlia believes that Iranian higher education centres must get more students from other countries due to an imminent fall in number of Iranian students that will be caused by a population reduction.
Currently, 1.3% of all students in Yazd University are foreigners, said the official who eyes a rise up to 5%.
“There have been 2,700 foreign applications for Yazd University,” Saleh Owlia added.
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