Three out of ten elementary, middle and high school students in South Korea were overweight or obese last year, new data suggests. 

The Ministry of Education on Tuesday announced the outcome of its analysis of health checkups at around one-thousand schools across the nation last year. 

It found that 19 percent of the students were obese last year, while 11-point-eight percent were overweight. That marks an increase of three-point-nine percentage points and one-point-one percentage points, respectively, from a previous survey conducted in 2019. 

The combined percentage of the students who are either obese or overweight at 30-point-eight percent is five percentage points higher than two years earlier and the highest level in five years. 

Declined physical activities amid the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as an increase in the intake of high-caloric and fatty foods contributed to the weight gains, the ministry said. 

Meanwhile, the average height of students also marked an overall increase over the two-year period with the average height of high-school seniors rising by zero-point-one centimeter to 174-point-one centimeters for males and by zero-point-four centimeters to 161-point-six centimeters for females.