Female graduates (file photo)

BEIJING, Oct. 27 (Xinhua) -- The majority of students in higher education institutions are female, and the number of women in the workforce has also increased, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed Friday.

In 2016, 50.6 percent of postgraduate students were female, exceeding the percentage of men for the first time. The same year women also accounted for 52.5 percent of college students.

Some 43.1 percent of the country's workforce was female at the end of 2016, with the number of female workers in urban regions reaching 65.18 million, up 34 percent from 2010.

There was also improvement in the gender imbalance in decision making, in both politics and business.

The ratio of female deputies to the 12th National People's Congress, the top legislature, reached a record high of 23.4 percent, 2.1 percentage points higher than the previous congress five years ago. Women accounted for 39.9 percent of the members of boards of directors in 2016, compared with 32.7 percent in 2010.