Holiday budget

    AROUND 60.8 percent of local residents have made holiday travel plans and the average budget for each trip is 3,955 yuan (US$577), a survey from the Shenzhen tourism administration showed.

    Calculating on the basis of 11.37 million permanent residents in Shenzhen as of the end of 2015, it is estimated that 6.92 million people will go traveling during the Spring Festival holidays and will spend 27.4 billion yuan.

    Among the travelers, only 13.3 percent will spend their holiday within the city and 33.9 percent will spend it within Guangdong Province. Nearly half of them will go to cities and provinces in other parts of China or overseas.

    Flower markets open

    SEVENTY-SEVEN flower markets opened Saturday in districts, new areas and communities across the city.

    According to the city’s urban administration, the flower markets will run until 10 p.m. on Friday, the Eve of Chinese New Year. The urban administration will collect deserted potted flowers at designated areas of housing estates. Enterprises, institutions and agencies can contact recycling enterprises for collection service on their doorstep.

    Holiday rush

    SHENZHEN officially entered the peak of the holiday travel rush starting Saturday with around 4 million travelers to be handled this week by railway and air services.

    Shenzhen Railway Station and Shenzhen East Railway Station have put all 23 temporary trains into service, and by Sunday there were limited tickets for trains to Nanxiong, Hengyang, Ankang, Wuchang, Guang’an, Xiangyang, Xinyang and Chongqing.

    Tickets for short trips between Shenzhen and Guangzhou are also in high demand. Travelers are advised to buy tickets to Dongguan and Guangzhou in advance.

    Mobike trip

    A CAR driver in Shenzhen was caught carrying a Mobike bike on his way home.

    The driver was spotted at a service station in the northern Guangdong part of the Beijing-Hong Kong-Macao Expressway. Shenzhen police contacted the driver, but the driver denied stealing the bike. The bike’s GPS showed that it had been taken from Shenzhen at 5:48 a.m. Saturday and entered Hengyang, Hunan Province, at around 4 p.m. Saturday, around 650 kilometers from Shenzhen.

    The driver faces detention or a six-month jail term if the alleged theft is confirmed.

    Former mayor probed

    THE Shenzhen People’s Procuratorate announced it had recently finished an investigation into a former mayor of Chaozhou City, Lu Chunjie, under the assignment of the Guangdong People’s Procuratorate.

    Lu was accused of taking bribes amounting to more than 2 million yuan (US$291,600) during the Chinese New Years of three consecutive years from 2013 to 2015. While being interrogated, Lu even justified his actions and claimed “it was normal to receive money during the Spring Festival.”

    Disqualified food

    YANTIAN’S inspection and quarantine bureau seized 27 batches of disqualified imported food between November last year and Friday.

    The imported goods, weighing 154 tons in total, included frozen meat, beverages, wine and tea. The bureau destroyed or returned all of the disqualified food to make sure that it would not be delivered to domestic markets.

    Customs clearance

    THE inspection and quarantine authority in Shenzhen has adjusted its list of import and export commodities subject to inspection and quarantine.

    Under the new policy that took effect Jan. 1, 12 kinds of import and export commodities will no longer be subject to inspection and quarantine, 17 kinds of export commodities will no longer be subject to inspection and quarantine and 168 kinds of import commodities will no longer be subject to inspection and quarantine.

    Inspection and quarantine officials said that the new policy is aimed at further facilitating enterprises and improving the efficiency of customs clearance. Some 1,800 enterprises and nearly US$900 million worth of commodities are expected to benefit from the new policy, according to the officials.

    Illegal fireworks

    NANSHAN police said that they had busted a woman known as Zhan, 50, for illegally storing fireworks in a rental apartment in Shekou on Friday afternoon.

    Police officers found a total of 37 boxes of various kinds of fireworks.

    The woman admitted that she had been illegally storing the fireworks. Zhan is currently under administrative detention for five days.