A shortage of professors to teach the new four-year university curriculum provides a powerful argument for raising the compulsory retirement age, academics say.
Universities have said they needed more than 1,000 professors to cope with the increased student numbers brought on by the new 3+3+4 system that starts next year.
Yet a 2008 survey by the Polytechnic University staff association calculated that 167 of its academic staff would reach retirement age by 2014.
'We need double the number of staff taking care of the double the number of students that will arrive in 2012,'' Baptist University staff association president Dr Mark Li Kin-yin said.
'In the short-term we should make use of the faculty staff and the administrative staff who have reached 60.'
Forced retirement at 60 is also out of line with global trends. In the US, Britain and Australia there is no mandatory retirement age for professors.