A new recruit hugs his family members goodbye in Taizhou, East China's Zhejiang Province before setting off for the barracks on September 20, 2022. The first batch of more than 800 recruits in the autumn of 2022 started their glorious military careers. Photo: VCG

China has revised its regulation on conscription work, putting an emphasis on recruiting highly qualified college students and stipulating rules for recalling skilled veterans during wartime. 

This is a necessary move for the People's Liberation Army (PLA) as China is deepening systematic reform of the military as well as improving combat capability during wartime amid a turbulent world, experts said.

The revision will take effect on May 1. It is a necessary move toward deepening reform of the national defense and the military, especially after the country has revised its national defense law and military service law.

The move also conforms to the requirement for high-quality personnel along with the acceleration of the mechanization, informatization and intelligentization of the PLA, according to the PLA Daily. 

The amended regulation stresses conscription of highly qualified soldiers with priority placed on college students. It notes that the conscription should be conducted based on the needs of the military. 

In order to guarantee the PLA's focus on combat preparation, the new regulation optimizes the process to deploy new soldiers. Local military service authorities should shoulder the main responsibility to recruit new soldiers. The new soldiers can also sign up directly, according to the regulation.

In consideration of guaranteeing conscription during wartime, the newly revised regulation stipulates that, should a state of war be declared, main attention could be shifted to conscript skilled veterans in order to form combat capacity rapidly.       

Conscripting soldiers from highly educated college students will help the PLA to increase overall quality and build a professionalized force, Song Zhongping, a Chinese military expert and TV commentator, told the Global Times on Thursday.      

Revision of relevant laws and regulations is a necessary move to guarantee the modernization of the PLA as the country aims to achieve modernization of the national defense and armed forces by 2035, Song said, noting the key is to ensure the military can rapidly scale up combat capacity and make the process more operable and executable given the turbulent world.

China has designed and carried out military reforms since the 18th National Congress of the CPC in 2012 in order to modernize national defense and the armed forces and turn the PLA into a world-class force, which is necessary to safeguard the country's national interests, according to observers.  

In 2021, the country updated its military service law with improvement in the welfare of military personnel and the system of registration for military service.