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Chinese Chew on Wads' Worth of Trouble

Posted on: Friday, 21 February 2003, 06:00 CST

Chinese Chew on Wads' Worth of Trouble

Source: Associated Press

he Ministry of Science and Technology is involved. Eight Chinese research institutions want a piece of the action. It's even part of a code-named project, the "863 program."

All to tackle a problem that has been bedeviling the Chinese government: how to clean up little blobs of discarded chewing gum from public places like Beijing's Tiananmen Square.

It's no small affair in China, where 2 billion pieces of gum are chewed annually, according to the state-controlled China Daily newspaper.

The project, which will cost $120,000, is designed to develop a special "gum-removal lotion" that can effectively dissolve the discarded gum, China Daily reported Friday.

Yu Xichun, director of the China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Association's science and technology office, said the problem has become a public sanitation headache.

During the National Day holiday last year, 600,000 tiny wads of chewed gum were left in Tiananmen Square by tourists, costing more than $120,000 to clean.

Beijing instituted a new law in November that slaps imposes fines of $2.40 to $6 on public gum-spitters.

The initiative is part of the country's "863 program," its high-tech development plan.

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Copyright © 2003 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

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