14 September 2006
Lhasa railway figures
(Xinhua) The Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) authorities report that the Golmud-Lhasa railway has carried 272,700 passengers and 37,400 tons of freight since entering service on 01 July. About 40 percent of the passengers were tourists, 30 percent business people and the rest students, transient workers, traders and people visiting relatives in Tibet, according to Jin Shixun, director of the Tibet Autonomous Regional Committee of Development and Reform. In July and August, 913,000 domestic and overseas tourists visited the region spending 942 million Yuan (UK£62.71m; US$117.75m; EUR€93.09m). Average occupancy for three-star and four-star hotels in Tibet over the past two months was 83.7 percent. Food and drink sales rose 55.7 percent from the same period the previous year to hit 127 million Yuan (about UK£8.45m; US$15.88m; EUR€12.55m).