CHINA – Visitor numbers to the Shanghai World Expo 2010 have fallen far short of the goal set by its organising committee.
With the stated aim of drawing in a total of 70m visitors over six months, the World Expo would need to see an average of 380,000 visitors per day. However, the Expo has seen significantly fewer guests per day.
Despite selling all 500,000 opening-day tickets, around 293,000 of the guests failed to materialise on the day.
More than 33m tickets have been sold so far, and the Shanghai government plans to give a free ticket to each household in the city to boost attendance.
It is thought that tight security and reports of queues of over 4 hours have dissuaded people from attending.
The expo opened on 1 May and will run until 31 October.
