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You are listening to NEWS Plus Special English. I'm Mark Griffiths in Beijing.
When Song Xiaomeng, a 25-year- old teacher in Shanghai, discussed her travel plans for the upcoming seven-day National Day holiday with her friends, they raised such destinations as Japan, South Korea, Thailand and Australia for consideration, but Hong Kong was not on the list.
Song said Hong Kong seems less appealing to them partly due to the lingering anti-mainland sentiment and its lack of new tourist attractions.
Song is not alone in holding such views. Hong Kong, for a long time one of the most popular destinations for Chinese mainlanders, saw slower growth of mainland tourist arrivals recently.
The number of mainland visitors to Hong Kong fell almost 10 percent in July, compared with the growth of 11 percent a year earlier.
Even Ocean Park, one of the most popular attractions as well as a must-see in Hong Kong, witnessed a 15-percent year-on-year plunge in tourist arrivals during the summer holiday.
In contrast, almost 580, 000 tourists from the Chinese mainland visited Japan in July, more than double the number in the same month last year.
This is NEWS Plus Special English.
Major polluting emissions in China have been on a large-scale decline in the first six months the year.
According to statistics released by the Ministry of Environmental Protection, year-on-year figures showed that the emission of chemical oxygen demand and other major pollutants decreased by 3 to 9 percent in the first half of this year.
China increased daily sewage treatment capacity by 3-and-a-half million tons, with total daily capacity achieving 175 million tons. Regulations were put in place for 270 paper-making, printing and dyeing operations requiring further treatment and recycling of waste water.
During the first six months, power plants that remove nitrogen oxide reached a capacity of 750 million kilowatts, accounting for 87 percent of total installed thermal power capacity.
Coal-fired power plants that remove sulfur dioxide now accounted for 96 percent of total installed coal-fired power capacity in China as of the end of June.
China has also increased gas usage by 750 million cubic meters, replacing almost 2 million tons of coal, in its nationwide coal-to-gas projects.
