"The results of the 2009 Hakka certification exam scheduled for Nov. 28-29 will be announced Jan. 15 and those who pass the exam will be eligible for the new incentive," said Minister of Hakka Affairs Huang Yu-cheng.

Noting that only elementary and junior high school students are eligible to the awards, Huang said that NT$1,000 (US$31) will be awarded to anyone who passes the elementary level test, while NT$5,000 and NT$10,000 will be given to those who pass the intermediate and high-intermediate level tests, respectively.

The CHA said that among the 13,641 people who have signed up to sit the exams, 6,662 will take the elementary test and 6,979 will take either the intermediate or high-intermediate test.

55 percent of the examinees are students, a significant increase of 24 percentage points compared to last year, while 50 percent are under the age of 20, a 27 percentage point increase from last year, it added.

Attributing the growing number to various promotional measures, such as the exemption of exam fees for people under the age of 19, the CHA said it will continue to launch further measures to encourage the public to learn Hakka.

The exams are subdivided into four categories according to the various Hakka accents, and some 10,000 people have passed them since they were launched in 2003.

Hakka dialect is one of the main subdivisions of the Chinese language spoken predominantly in southern China by Hakka people and descendants in diasporas throughout East and Southeast Asia and around the world.