The total number of telephone users in east China's Jiangsu Province exceeded 50 million at the end of March, said provincial communications administration director, Lu Maofeng.

Speaking Friday at a press conference in Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu Province, the official said Jiangsu is the second province after the southern Guangdong Province to have telephone users exceeding 50 million.

The official said the number of Jiangsu's telephone users reached a record 50.2 million in 2005, four percent growth compared to the same period last year.

Jiangsu has 27.1 million fixed telephone users and the holders of mobile phones in the province reached 23.1 million.

The official said for every one hundred people in Jiangsu there are 68 phones, 15 percent higher than China's average.

Lu said China's six major telecom corporations including China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom, together with more than 400 service companies, have made a highly developed telecommunication network in the province.

He predicted that by 2010, Jiangsu will have 75 million telephone users, one for every person in the province. This nears the standard for developed nations.

The number of telephone users in China increased to 660 million at the end of this March.

(Xinhua)