Four days before the opening of the annual meeting of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, members of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), who are gathering in Beijing to attend the fourth CPPCC session due to open on March 3, have already begun to browse the website of the latest official statistics in their hotel rooms.

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has developed a homepage on the joint on-line consulting system for the NPC and CPPCC sessions.

In the past, the NBS only set up a desk in the venue of the annual meetings and provided printed materials for NPC deputies and members of the CPPCC National Committee.

During this annual NPC session to be held from March 5, the NBS will send the statistics directly to the hotels of the delegates through computer networks 24 hours a day. In addition, it has opened an electronic billboard on its homepage so that they can request for specific information by leaving a message.

The NBS homepage for the NPC and CPPCC is not only placed on the intranet of the sessions, but also linked to the Internet through the website of the NBS. Therefore people from around the world can see what the NPC deputies and CPPCC members say on the website.

"Scientific decision making is based on ample information," renowned economist and NPC deputy Li Yining wrote on the electronic billboard.

(People's Daily 03/02/2001)