by Shannon TEOH

NUSAJAYA, February 21, 2014 (AFP) - At Newcastle University's medical school, students tread red-brick paths through a green campus bearing Victorian touches in a scene that befits a top college in northern England.

But this setting is sweltering tropical Malaysia, where select departments of several European universities have joined in a shared-campus concept to tap growing Asian demand for sought-after Western degrees.

Distance and cost concerns combine to keep many Asian students and Western universities apart.

But the shared nature of facilities in the 123-hectare (305-acre) "EduCity" in southern Malaysia, and resulting lower start-up costs, allows institutions to gain an Asian foothold while passing savings on to students.

Malaysian student Kanesh Rajoo pays just 60 percent of the 120,000-pound tuition ($200,000) charged at Newcastle University Medical School's UK campus and saves a small fortune in British living costs.

"Because of the reputation of obtaining a recognised UK degree, I will probably have an upper hand (in Malaysia's job market) as compared to those from a local university," Kanesh said while studying in NUMed's spacious library.

Multi-university concepts have been tried elsewhere with mixed success but the Malaysian government project hopes to set itself apart by cherry-picking respected individual university departments.

Colleges, meanwhile, get a slice of a growing education market in developing Asia.

Non-EU enrollment in universities in Britain grew by 20 percent to 300,000 students from 2008 to 2012, according to the British government. It forecasts four million students per year will seek study abroad globally by 2024, one-third of them from China and India.

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Western colleges find common ground on Malaysia campus