Expo attendance falls short

• Source: Global Times
• [02:37 May 05 2010]
• Comments

IPR concerns

Alongside concern about falling visitor numbers, forgery issues also pose a challenge to organizers.

The Shanghai-based Xinmin Evening News reported Tuesday that fake Haibao - the official mascot of the expo - has hit the market days after the opening of the largest-ever expo in history, mostly targeting children and foreigners. The public are warned to avoid buying fake ones because they may pose risks to their health.

Roadside vendors are seen peddling fake Haibao to visitors in a picture published by the newspaper. According to the paper, fake Haibao has no anti-fake certificate, but it is still popular among the public.

"A palm-sized Haibao is valued at 10 yuan. Sometimes, I could sell some 200," a ven-dor told the paper.

A staff member with a franchised store of the Expo told the paper that fake Haibao could pose serious risks to buyers' health.

"Shanzhai (fake) ones are filled with poor-quality cotton, which will harm children's and adults' health," the employee told the paper.

Chen Tao, a member of the criminal law committee of the Beijing Bar Association, told the Global Times that in an effort to remove fake Haibao from the streets, the admini-stration departments for industry and commerce and quality inspection should enhance their supervision over the infringement of the right of the Expo symbols. And the public is responsible for reporting fakery to the competent authorities.

Chinese pavilion

Although visitor numbers are not as high as expected, some popular pavilions are still crowded. The Chinese pavilion still needs a reservation in order to visit it, and visitors were in a long queue at around 10 am Tuesday.

The Taiwan Pavilion, which also requires a reservation to enter, sold out its 4,000 tickets in half an hour.

Despite reports of hours-long queens and dozens of heat-stroke victims, the expo is still an appealing occasion, even for Beijingers, who witnessed the largest-ever Olympic Games in history in 2008.

"The expo is fascinating," said 30-year-old Li Bo, who traveled to Shanghai from Beijing. "It's crowded and I had to stand in line for almost an hour, but I was expecting that," he said after visiting the Chinese pavilion Tuesday.

Other popular pavilions, like the Swiss, French, British, German and French ones also drew a lot of visitors.

Guo Qiang contributed to this story