The latest statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry (MII) show that by the end of May 2006 the number of telephone users in China had exceeded 780 million, of which more than 363 million were fixed phone users and over 420 million were mobile phone users.

The statistics reveal that China's mobile phone users grew more rapidly than fixed phone users, increasing by an average of 5.48 million per month, which made the total mobile phone user population 12.9 million more than the end of last year.

In comparison, the number of fixed phone users rose steadily with a monthly increase of only 2.58 million during the period.

In addition, statistics show that China's postal communications income reached CNY28.782 million by the end of May, increasing 11.4% compared with the same period last year. Of that total, income from telecom services increased by 11.3% and postal service by 11.7%.