All pupils will study a foreign language for their Junior Cert by 2021 under ambitious new plans to be announced by the Education Minister.

The strategy also aims to increase by 10 percent the number of Leaving Cert Students studying a foreign language.

Chinese will be introduced as a Leaving Cert subject for the first time, and so-called heritage languages such as Polish, Lithuanian and Portuguese will get a proper curriculum.

Juliette Gash reports: