The number of people studying Japanese overseas reached 2.1 million in 1998, up 30 percent from five years earlier, according to a Japan Foundation survey announced Wednesday.
Japanese-language education was being given at 10,930 institutions or organizations, a rise of 60 percent from 1993, in 115 countries and territories, the foundation said. The number of teachers was roughly 28,000, up 30 percent.
The vast majority of students were in South Korea, which had about 950,000. Australia was next with 310,000, China with 250,000, Taiwan with 160,000 and the United States with 110,000, according to the Foreign Ministry affiliate.
During the five-year span, the number of Japanese-language learners in Mongolia, Vietnam and Sri Lanka tripled or quadrupled, while those in Russia more than doubled, the foundation said.
But the number of Japanese-language learners in Indonesia fell by up to 30 percent, it said.
Japanese-language teaching in primary schools and junior and senior high schools was given to some 1.38 million at 6,280 institutions in 58 countries and territories, it said.
About 80 percent of the primary education institutions began teaching Japanese in the 1990s, indicating that many more younger people are learning the language, the foundation said.