BEIJING -- The Chinese government on Sunday promulgated a revised decree to strike the activities of driving up prices through hoarding or cheating.The revision was made on the basis of regulations passed in 1999 and amended in February 2006 by the State Council.The new decree, effective as of Sunday, raises the maximum fine to 1 million yuan(US,000), which almost triples the sum in the old regulations, for those who manipulate market prices and ignore the prices advised by the government under emergencies.Commercial associations which deliberately spread rumors on price information can be fined at a maximum of 500,000 yuan. Those who severely violate the decree may have their legal certificates revoked.The State Council and local governments can set profit ratios or price ceilings for key items of goods and services when prices rise too sharp, according to the decree.
Almost 85 percent of Chinese people share just 100 surnames, with Wang, which literally means "king", being the most popular, the Xinhua news agency said on Tuesday. There are 93 million Wangs in China, followed closely by 92 million people with the family name Li and 88 million called Zhang, Xinhua said, citing newly-announced calculations by the Ministry of Public Security. Another seven common names -- including Chen, Zhou and Lin -- have at last 20 million members each, it added. Chinese family names can be traced back thousands of years and people generally feel a closeness to those with the same surname. But there are also some family names which are only used by a very few people, such as Guo, meaning to "cross over", and Mu, which means "mother".
TAIYUAN -- Fifteen miners have been confirmed dead following Saturday's gas explosion in a coal mine in Linfen City, north China's Shanxi Province, rescuers said on Sunday. Rescue operation is still going on. The gas blast occurred around 1:50 p.m. on Saturday at Pudeng Coal Mine in Kecheng Township of Puxian County. About 30 miners were trapped underground, according to preliminary estimates. "The exact number of miners trapped underground is yet to be affirmed," said a spokesman for Shanxi Provincial Bureau of Coal Mine Safety Supervision. The cause of the gas explosion is being investigated. Pudeng Coal Mine, which is in operation with permits, produces 150,000 tons of coal a year. Zhao Tiechui, director of the State Administration for Coal Mine Safety Supervision, together with local officials have rushed to the accident site to direct rescue efforts.
BEIJING -- The dumpling poisoning incident in Japan has been proved to be an individual contrived case, not caused by pesticide residue, said China's quality watchdog on Thursday.The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) said at a press conference that it made the conclusion after finding no harmful chemicals in relative products and samples and no abnormal operations by the Chinese producer.Japanese media reported on January 10 that people fell ill in December and January after consuming frozen meat dumplings produced by Tianyang Food Plant based in north china's Hebei Province.
LOS ANGELES - More Chinese tourists are expected to visit the United States as new travel rules between the two nations are pending, a report said on Sunday.Southern California is a likely destination for middle- and upper-class visitors with money to spend, said the Los Angeles Times.Travels agencies are preparing for what they hope could be a boom in new Chinese tourism to the United States that is expected to occur next year.Both nations are finalizing a deal to ease entry restrictions and lift a ban in China on promoting travel to the United States, according to the paper.The negotiations have been going on for several years, but China's government news agencies and sources at the US Commerce Department said a deal should be completed within the next few weeks, said the paper.The new travel rules are expected to be a particular boom to Southern California, which already sees more Chinese tourists - 110,000 in Los Angeles County last year - than anywhere else in the United States. But travel officials expect that number to grow significantly if more members of China's emerging middle and upper classes are able to travel to the region for vacations.China's travel industry is currently prohibited from marketing the United States as a travel destination because of disputes over the strict entry process initiated after 9/11 - a reality that US officials blame on the need for national security and concerns about visitors overstaying their visas, said the paper.
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The average pork price has dropped to 12.61 yuan this week, 9.61 percent lower than the peak price on August 9, said China's economic planner after pork prices nearly doubled in the past eight months due to short supply and mounting production costs.The prices have seen a consecutive drop for the eighth week, down by 3.45 percent from the end of August, as the piglets raised since May and June grew ready for the market to add to the pork supply.Pigs daily butchered in 36 major cities have increased by 12.6 percent from August, and the supply is expected to keep rising, said the National Development and Reform Commission.But the Ministry of Commerce said the decline in the pork prices would probably stop as demand surges during the ongoing National Day holiday and feedstuff prices stay high.The soaring pork prices is a major contributor to the general food price hikes that drive up the consumer price index to a 6.5 percent increase in August.
Land authorities in six Chinese cities including Beijing have illegally charged 1.1 billion yuan (US6.7 million) on enterprises so far this year, adding fuel to the nation's soaring housing prices. This was discovered by the National Development and Reform Commission, China's top planning body, during examinations of charges on businesses in Beijing, Shijiazhuang, Jinan, Guangzhou, Chengdu and Xi'an, the Beijing News said Saturday. The amount was well beyond the total illegal charges collected by eight departments for the whole year of 2006, said Li Lei, head of NDRC's Price Supervision Department. Quoting estimates by the land authorities, which say land costs account for 20 percent to 50 percent of the housing prices, Li said the behavior of these authorities has made the runaway housing prices worse. Despite by rounds after rounds of government curbs including restrictions on housing ownership by foreigners, housing prices have rocketed in China over the last few years, to the agony of ordinary people. Land authorities are not alone in overcharging enterprises. The commission found in May that urban construction departments have overcharged 216 million yuan (US.8 million) from construction firms. "The illegal charges have added fuel to the rising house price, " Li said. The housing prices in 70 large- and medium-sized cities in China went up by 7.1 percent in June over the same period last year, according to official statistics.
A leading Chinese trade union for journalists is considering action against a bogus "official" website for the organization. The website -- www.acja.cn -- runs genuine news industry information and links, as well as the emblem of the All-China Journalists Association (ACJA), the ACJA announced in Beijing Wednesday. "The fake website claims it is the website of the ACJA and uses the emblem of ACJA on their website," Gu Yonghua, ACJA party secretary said. "Under the name of ACJA, it even runs recruitment advertisements, carries advertisements and operates other business," Gu said. The fake website uses the abbreviation of the ACJA''''s English name as its domain name, while the genuine official website of the ACJA -- www.zgjx.cn -- uses the abbreviation of the Pinyin, phonetic Chinese name. "The fake website has several unhealthy links that impair the reputation of ACJA," claimed Gu. "The website has infringed on the rights of the ACJA," Gu said, warning Internet users to avoid the bogus site. The ACJA, formerly the China Youth Journalists Association, was founded in Shanghai on Nov. 8, 1937. The association, as a national association for Chinese journalists, has 223 local association members representing750,000 Chinese journalists. The genuine website for the ACJA was just opened in February. The fake website carries the claim that it opened 10 years ago and is planning to go public. It is linked to several media websites, including The People''s Daily and the Washington Post. Search engines like Google and Baidu are also on its webpage. However, the server and operators of the website are still unknown, sources with ACJA said. The ACJA was contacting the Ministry of Information Industry and other government agencies to identify the operators and servers and would take legal action against the website if necessary, said ACJA sources.