IN BRIEF (Page 10)

COFCO pig-raising project

A five-year pig raising project involving a 9.7 billion yuan investment was launched recently by China National Cereals, Oils and Foodstuffs Corp (COFCO) in Hubei province, which aims to make the central Chinese province the nation's largest pig-raising base.

In the next five years, COFCO will build a 500,000-reproducible sow breeding base, a 10 million live pig-raising demonstration project, and it will set up centers for pig breeding technology research and pig disease prevention, according to Yu Xubo, COFCO president.

Songhua pollution control

A total of 7 billion yuan will be invested in 116 projects to treat Songhua River pollution this year. The investment will support researching technologies aiming at the river's pollution characteristics, such as organic pollutants.

Pollution control and prevention of the Songhua River has been written into the country's 11th Five-Year Plan (2006-10), with a total investment of 13 billion yuan.

Three Gorges airport

The overall plan for the Three Gorges (Sanxia) Airport has been approved by the south-central division of the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China (CAAC).

According to the plan, the airport will be expanded to a medium international one and will open fixed international flights to Japan and South Korea. The airport now has 26 domestic routes to major cities.

The airport runway will be expanded from its current length of 2,600 m to 3,200 m, the construction area of the terminal building will be increased from 14,000 sq m to 54,000 sq m and a parallel runway will be added. The airport's annual capacity is expected to reach 1.6 million passengers by 2015 and 5 million by 2035.

Transport network planned

Wang Dong, director of the Guangzhou urban planning bureau, revealed that the capital of Guangdong province will be covered by an underground transportation network by 2020.

Guangzhou will construct 296 km of underground railways from 2010 to 2020, based on the current plan to finish the construction of 255 km the lines by 2010.

The underground transportation network is expected to connect the city with secondary urban centers including Huadu, Nansha and Panyu.

New Shanghai station

Construction will begin this year on Shanghai's biggest railway station in Changning district, local media reported.

The Hongqiao Railway Station has a designed daily capacity of 200,000 people, more than the combined capacity of the current two railway stations in Shanghai. The new station will mainly serve passenger trains on the Shanghai-Beijing, Shanghai-Nanjing and Shanghai-Hangzhou railways.

The station will also connect to the west terminal building of Hongqiao Airport and three metro lines to become the city's biggest transportation hub.

Rural tourism project

The French tourism department will cooperate with Anhui province to build a rural tourism demonstration project in Yi county.

By taking advantages of the techniques and marketing expertise of France, Yi county will be developed into a resort demonstration area in the rural tourism sector in accordance with international standards, instead of the current model of pure cultural sightseeing.

New emission charges

Charges for sulfur dioxide emission in Shanxi province will be adjusted, according to local authorities.

The new standard stipulates that enterprises that haven't completed the construction of flue gas desulphurization facilities or where emission of sulfur dioxide has exceeded the standard, will be charged 1.26 yuan per kg, compared with the previous 0.63 yuan per kg.

As for enterprises that have the facilities and are within the standard, the charges will remain unchanged.

(China Daily 03/24/2008 page10)