ABSTRACT
Education is an important issue in Hong Kong and one of the major items in public expenditure. Hong Kong began to have its own system of external quality assurance in higher education starting with the establishment of the Hong Kong Council for Academic Accreditation in 1990 as a statutory body, to provide accreditation for higher education institutions in Hong Kong, and to provide authoritative advice to the Government of Hong Kong on matters of educational quality and quality assurance. It is one of the Hong Kong Council for Academic Accreditation's (HKCAA) principles to promote the capability of the tertiary institutions to accredit its own degree programmes. The new spate of expansion in higher education has intensified the need to establish a Qualifications Framework for Hong Kong, to facilitate a clear definition of the different levels of qualifications and to enable the transfer and articulation of qualifications.
