Beijing Capital International Airport, a key travel hub for international visitors, plans to lower food prices at its restaurants.

Food outlets will reduce the price of a single dish by as much as 33 percent, according to the Beijing Youth Daily.

Currently, there are 43 restaurants in the airport's two terminals. Twenty-five of them are food chains that will cut their prices and charge customers what they would pay at the same chain restaurants in Beijing's central business district. The other 18 restaurants will adjust their prices according to prices at similar restaurants in the city.

Altogether, 248 categories of dishes are involved in the price reform, accounting for 11 percent of the entire food products offered at the airport.

Meanwhile, 3.25 million yuan (US$437,800) has been earmarked to improve the restaurants' facilities and service in the airport.

The price adjustments will be completed by the end of November, and investments to upgrade the restaurants will be made by mid-December, according to the report.

High facility rental fees and a lack of competition have caused the airport restaurants to set high food prices, it added.

(CRI November 19, 2007)