Biz Scene: Local

Air quality

North China's Hebei Province, which surrounds Beijing, will spend 21 billion yuan in a bid to cut air pollution before next summer's Olympic Games, Xinhua reported.

The money will fund projects that could cut about 550,000 tons of sulfur dioxide emissions annually. Funds will be used for 34 desulfurization systems at power plants and 56 pollution-curbing projects at chemical plants. The province will also build 23 centralized plants that will provide heat to homes to cut coal use, it said.

Freight turnover

Qingdao, a coastal city in East China's Shandong Province, achieved a freight turnover of more than 200 million tons from January to September.

The port's container turnover amounted to 7 million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent units) in the period, exceeding the annual volume for 2005.

Total turnover included 56.49 million tons of iron ore and 33.11 million tons of petroleum.

(China Daily 10/10/2007 page15)