A newly married couple raise a toast to guests at their wedding feast in Qiandongnan Miao and Dong autonomous prefecture in Guizhou province in January, 2017. [Photo by Peng Huan / For China Daily] Yunnan authorities issued a notice to regulate wedding and funeral banquet costs to 200 yuan ($31.7) per table and the amount of gift money to 100 yuan per person in rural areas to eradicate extravagancy, China News Agency reported. The notice also requires banquet holders to restrict the number of guests to 200 or 10 tables (usually 10 guests per table). The wedding meals should have no more than 12 courses per table, with the number of meat courses accounting for less than half. The move aims to implement eight-point regulation on frugality for Party members, and increase people's sense of gain and happiness by relieving them from economic burdens. Only wedding ceremonies for the holders themselves or their children and funeral ceremonies for the holder's spouse or lineal relatives are allowed to invite guests and receive gift money, according to the notice released by the Yunnan Provincial discipline inspection commission and supervisory commission. Banquets are not allowed on occasions such as birthdays, graduations, army enrollments, employment, retirement, building houses and relocation. Expensive ceremonies for occasions such as weddings and funerals are still common in some parts of China. Hosts under social pressure see these as a way of gaining face, but use up the family's savings and accumulate debt that takes years to pay back. Such banquets are not free to guests, as attendees are expected to give gift money. It is not unusual for poorer guests to borrow money so that they can give money and not lose face. The notice warns that if Party officials or government officials hold or attend extravagant banquets, they will violate Party discipline and regulations and be punished. Village officials are responsible for educating and persuading villagers. If any villager holds an extravagant banquet, it is a dereliction of duty and the official responsible will be held accountable and even be punished. Extravagant banquet holders will also be punished according to related regulations. The notice with specific limits on expenditures caused much discussion both online and offline. One of the issues people complain about most is extravagant banquets, said Yang Mingxian, Party secretary of Wenlu village, Wenlong township, Jingdong Yi Ethnic autonomous county, Pu'er, Yunnan province. Since the notice came out, it is well-founded to deal with the problem now. A Sina Weibo blogger called Shenyebuliaotian applauds such limits, saying that it is a huge burden to give and pay back gift money, and the evil tendency of comparing expensive banquets should be stopped. But some netizens doubt whether the notice can be put into practice. An internet user, named Student Zhangxiaobo, thinks the money is too small to prepare a banquet, asking, How many courses could be made with only 200 yuan? Another netizen, using the name of Augur Jina, finds it hard to define meat courses, saying, Is celery with meat a meat course or a vegetable course? With no further explanation, the notice points out village Party branches and village committees can make detailed rules and procedures under the guidelines of the notice. silicone bandcustom silver braceletscustom awareness wristbandssilicone bracelets no minimum orderbracelets for a cause
Smokers take a break at the Olympic Green in Beijing. KUANG LINHUA / CHINA DAILY China's national tobacco regulator's plan to increase sales has been criticized as going against the trend of tobacco control. The State Tobacco Monopoly Administration, the national regulatory body of tobacco industry, and China National Tobacco Corp, a company it runs, set a target of 47.5 million boxes of cigarettes to be sold by the end of the year at an interior meeting this month, according to a report from Science and Technology Daily. That marks an increase of 122,000 boxes, or 6.1 billion cigarettes, from last year. Experts criticized the target as going against the trend of tobacco control in the world's largest tobacco consumer and producer. Zhi Xiuyi, the deputy head of the Chinese Association of Tobacco Control, told China Youth Daily: There is no doubt that smoking is harmful to people's health, a fact the STMA should be well aware of. However, it insists on increasing the sales volume of tobacco and enlarging smoking population, which will hamper the realization of targets proposed in the Healthy China 2030 plan, he said. Healthy China 2030, a national blueprint on improving people's health, aims to cut down the proportion of smokers in the Chinese population from 27 to 20 percent by 2030. As world's largest producer and consumer of cigarettes, China has 315 million smokers, accounting for 30 percent of world's smoking population. In a step toward creating a healthier environment, China has adopted a series of measures to reduce smoking in public spaces. The country's advertisement law, formulated in 1994, banned tobacco advertisements in public media such as TV and radio, and public areas including sports venues and theaters. China ratified the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in 2003, which came into effect in 2006. The convention requires contracting parties to ban smoking in public spaces, reduce tobacco supplies and consumption, ban tobacco advertising and raise taxes. Starting in 2014, officials are not allowed to smoke in public areas. Besides, 18 cities have also adopted tobacco control regulations. Beijing, for example, smoking is banned in all indoor public areas and workplaces starting in 2015. After three years, the smoking population of the city has dropped by around 4 percent, according to a Beijing Youth Daily report. Due to tobacco control measures and a heightened awareness of the harm of smoking, sales volume of cigarettes started dropping since reaching its peak in 2014 after growing annually for two decades. But the sales volume in 2017 bounced back and is expected to rise again this year, said Li Jinkui, a health expert. He said profit is behind the higher sales targets. To resolve the contradiction between tobacco sales and the social context of tobacco control, we should reduce supply and consumption of tobacco as required by the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, Li was quoted as saying by the Science and Technology Daily.
