From the chinese press

The sorry state of water pricing

By transferring the expenses for maintaining, building and repairing water pipe networks, supposedly to be paid from budgetary funds, and some arbitrary administrative charges to the cost of supplying water, local government agencies are doing what they are not supposed to do and not doing what they are supposed to, says an article in Xinhua Daily Telegraph. Excerpts:

At a symposium on whether the water pricing mechanism should be made public, all the representatives of water companies agreed to do so. But the idea was opposed by most representatives of local price administration authorities.