New teachers of English and Putonghua in Hong Kong's primary and secondary schools will face different proficiency tests from the next academic year with the government scrapping some of its own assessments, the Education Bureau announced on Wednesday.

Rather than taking writing and speaking tests conducted by the bureau and the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority, English teachers will have to sit an exam under the International English Language Testing System (IELTS), while Putonghua teachers must pass the Test of Proficiency in Putonghua conducted by the State Language Commission.

The existing classroom language assessment will remain in place.

A bureau circular says English teachers without an English degree and who have not received training specialised in the language should attain an overall score of 7.5 or above in IELTS, with at least a 7 in each of the four tests - listening, reading, writing and speaking - in the same test report.

Those taking up the position of English panel chair should score at least an 8 overall, while attaining nothing below 7.5 in the four assessments separately.

The test score remains valid for up to two years and new or newly deployed English teachers holding a regular post with the valid results will be considered to have met the language proficiency requirements.

"If teachers have attained the specified results... in the Academic Module of IELTS which are still valid when taking teaching the English Language subject, they are not required to resit the test," according to the circular.

Putonghua teachers, meanwhile, will have to attain a "Grade A, Level 2" or above. It means scoring at least 87 out of 100 in the assessment.

The bureau also said that those who have met the language proficiency requirements of the current assessments will continue to be qualified to teach.

The administration said it is making the changes after considering concerns from the education sector, the latest trends of education development, pupils' learning needs and schools' needs regarding the deployment of human resources.

Mervyn Cheung from the Hong Kong Education Policy Concern Organisation said the national Putonghua test could be adopted, but he believes the existing language proficiency assessment should be kept.

"We already have students studying in universities taking IELTS, in order to show their English standard in applying for entry to different jobs and professions, so it's not specific to education, especially to the teaching profession," he told RTHK.

"The [language proficiency assessment] is teaching-specific in a Hong Kong context. They are very different in terms of the design and the purpose of the two tests."