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Coastal tours become popular

During the National Day holiday, a large number of tourists conducted tours to the Xiangshan Port coastal area, to experience the fishing life, the marine culture and the direct touch of the sea. 
At the noon of October 4, a lot of cars from Shanghai, Taizhou, Ningbo and other cities were parking along the Qifeng Pier of Chunhu Town of Fenghua County. "This is my second tour to the sea today. All the leisure fishing boats are all full." said Shen Jisong, owner of the No. 033 leisure fishing boat. It is reported that at least 3000 tourists went to the Xiangshan Port by boat from the leisure fishing boat piers in Fenghua County and Ninghai County. "The restaurants are fully booked and all the hotels have been booked in advance." said one of the staff of a restaurant near the Xiangshan Port Bridge. According to him, as the restaurant is located near the pier, it has timely access to the fresh aquatic products, and thus has attracted a great number of tourists. 
Besides the seafood and fishing boats, the vegetable markets of the coastal towns of Xiangshan Port have attracted many tourists from the urban Ningbo area. At the Xianxiang Vegetable Market, the rice bun is quite popular with citizens. According to a Mr. Xu, one of the owners of the rice bun stools, the buns are sold out usually before 10 o'clock in the morning, and some customers buy a lot as the buns are home-made and quite unique in flavor. 
"There is a large stretch of beach and scenic spots. With the opening of the freeways and the coastal highways, it only takes about one hour to get to the coastal area from the city center. It brings the citizens convenience for leisure and recreation." said an owner of a farm stay in Qiucun Village of Fenghua County

Service Industry Promoted in an All-around Way

“Confidence is the key to ‘start a new undertaking’. We must build confidence and fully engaged in ‘starting new undertakings’. Recently, the party committee and government of Hushan street invited 13 enterprises that are engaged in the local traditional service industry, new innovation industries and newly introduced commercial industry to express their determinations on the symposium themed to realize the leapfrog development in the service industry .
Located in the downtown of Cixi, Hushan Street possesses rich cultural heritages, assembling services, various industries and mature functional zone. In the past year, its added value of service industry reached 5.1 billion yuan, with year-on-year growth of 8.8 percent, accounting for 93 percent of GDP and taking up an eighth of the whole city's services. In the first half of this year, its added value of service industry amounted to 2.7 billion, with year-on-year growth of 8 percent. Facing depressed real estate market, sluggish hotel & lodging industry and slowing wholesale and retail industry growth, service industry in this street still developed rapidly, providing a strong support for economic development.

In the symposium, people analyzed the severe situation in current street service industry and discussed such problems as “How to break bottleneck in developing modern service industry”, “Introduce more talents in service industry” and “How should the second generation of entrepreneurs inherit and develop service industry”. Zhao bainian, general manager of Jiashulin Landscape Engineering Co., Ltd, Cao Jianbo, general manager of second-hand market, and vice-general manager of Cixi Yintai Commercial Management Co., Ltd thought that in spite of the downturn in economic situation and difficulties in service industry, entrepreneurs should persist in confidence and endeavor. Facing the new situation, entrepreneurs must boost confidence, sublate traditional pattern and overcome development bottleneck timely with knowledge, wisdom and technology. At the same time, the government and relevant departments should greatly support service industry in talents introduction, financing, land and revenue to help enterprises overcome the current difficulties. On the spot, principals of banks, IRS, LTB and market supervision said they will give enterprises their full support.

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Ningbo Leading Increases in Total Retail Sales of Consumer Goods

Since the second half of 2015, the consumer market in Ningbo has been on a fast track of growth, reversing a downward trend successfully. It is recorded in a latest statistics that Ningbo has registered 98.73 billion yuan in total retail sales of consumer goods from January to August, up by 9.7% over last year. That makes Ningbo a leader in the growing momentum across Zhejiang Province. Beyond that, the port city has seen rises in such sales for 4 straight months.

Last week, businesses in Ningbo leveraged the opportunity of a changing season and a drop in gold prices by heavily promoting clothes, hats, caps, shoes and gold accessories. As such, Erbai and Yintai, two leading retailers, hit a record high in sales during the Mid-autumn festival. Since the beginning of the second half of 2015, Ningbo has seen visible hikes in sales of daily necessities, gold, silver and jewelries, which has become a strong driver for consumption. From January to August, the entire city has recorded 22.6 billion yuan, or an increase of 17.8%, in sales of daily necessities above a designated level, accounting for 22,9% of total retail sales of consumer goods, driving up 3.8 percentage points. Among them, total sales of clothes, shoes, hats and knitted goods reached 11.21 billion yuan, accounting for 11,3% of total retail sales of consumer goods, driving up 2.6 percentage points.

Sales of gold, silver and jewelries have emerged from sapping growth. From January to August, retail sales of gold, silver and jewelries hit 1.57 billion yuan, up by 2.4%. Sales accounted for 21.1% and 16.2% in July and August respectively. Furniture has maintained a relatively fast growth, the driving force behind it is anaemic, though. According to statistics, from January to August, furniture sales totaled 6.86 billion yuan, a rise of 29.6%, accounting for 1.7 percentage points. The figure downed 0.3 points over the same period of last year.

Sales in catering sector have shown a downward trend following continued heightened growth. According to statistics, from January to August, the port city has registered a turnover of 3.79 billion yuan in catering, up by 9.7%. The increase came in at the third provincially, though it has downed 1.9 percentage points. “Restaurants entail marketing strategies with local characteristics and friendlier specialties for more customers after reform and transformation.” So said a responsible person from Ningbo Catering Association, “Xiao Er Mei” Restaurant is poised to emerge as the mainstream down the road. He added, “Scale Catering has steadily lost its competitive edge amid increasingly personalized consumer needs. Rather, experiential, individualized catering culture is gaining rising popularity.”

There is still a long way to go for the transformation of conventional retailers. From January to August, Ningbo has seen a dip of 1.4% in the sales volume of leading grocery stores. Only 5 key sales market registered negative sales growths. Sales of 3 leading convenient stores rose by 1.2%.

Metro Line 2 runs across Ningbo’s 4 districts in 48 mins

The phase one of Ningbo metro line 2 opened on September 26, 2015 which attracted many people. The metro line 2 has 22 stations and travels across Ningbo’s 4 districts (Yinzhou District, Haishu District, Jiangbei District and Zhenhai District) in 48 minutes with a total traveling distance of 28.35kms. Compared with the three days’ trial run, all the stations of metro line 2 are improved to make it more convenient for the passengers. 
More seats and clearer guidance signs
Seats are availble for people in Gulou Station, Lishe International Airport Station and other stations. The guidance signs are clearer. For example, the signs of the entrance and the exit are more eye-catching; the signs outside the Ningbo University Station are more noticeable. In addition, the temperature inside the station is also regulated. “These improvements are based on the suggestions raised by the passengers during the trial run.” said the officer from Ningbo Municipal Rail Transit Operation Company.
No need to worry about being late for the trains and planes
Ningbo railway station and Lishe International Airport Station are important stations in Ningbo. The shuttles travel every 7.5 minutes and they take only 3 minutes to the airport. The time table of the shuttles are quite clear which says that the earliest shuttle will be on 7:25 and the last shuttle will be on 22:25. “I had to take several buses before arriving at the airport. But today I got on the subway at 9:25 at Qing Shuifu Station and arrived here in 40 minutes. I don’t worry about being late for the planes anymore!” says Mr. Liu, who will fly to Tianjin to meet his girlfriend. The shuttles will arrive at the picking-up floor and people can notice the signs on the pillars opposite to the gate of hall 1 of the picking-up floor. The sign says that “please take the metro line 2 here!” and many people choose to get on the shuttles directly with their luggage.

Happy national Holidays

We the Team and makers of Ningboexpat.com  and NingboLife.com wish you a healthy and enjoyable holiday. See you Back in Ningbo and travel save. If you stay in town, we might be meeting somewhere somehow.

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