China's online transactions rise during Spring Festival holiday

China's online transactions saw a remarkable increase in both volume and value during the just-concluded Spring Festival holiday, data from the People's Bank of China (PBOC) showed on Tuesday.

From Feb 15 to 23, Chinese online payment-clearing house NetsUnion Clearing Corporation and card payment giant China UnionPay processed approximately 39.3 billion online transactions totaling 13.12 trillion yuan (about 1.9 trillion U.S. dollars), according to the PBOC.

Compared to last year's Spring Festival holiday period, the average daily number of transactions rose by 37.45 percent and the average daily value of transactions by 19.26 percent.

The PBOC data also showed that in the same comparison period, the average daily value of transactions that inbound travelers made using the two platforms increased 78.1 percent in volume and 44.33 percent in value.

The Spring Festival, which is also known as Chinese New Year, fell on Feb 17 this year. It is usually a period of vibrant consumption activities as people return home for family reunions or travel to tourist destinations to celebrate the holiday.

A wild giant panda was captured on infrared cameras strolling through forests in the Sichuan section of the Giant Panda National Park, located in Pingwu County, Mianyang City, southwest China's Sichuan Province.

The footage, recorded on Sunday, shows a round-bodied wild giant panda wandering leisurely through the forest, stopping occasionally to rest. According to park staff, this is an adult giant panda in robust health.

Pingwu County in northern Sichuan is famous for being home to a large number of wild giant pandas. The fourth national survey of giant pandas in 2015 found that there were 1,864 wild giant pandas in China, including 335 in Pingwu.

As a result, over half of Pingwu's land area has been designated as part of the Giant Panda National Park, which has a planned area of 22,000 square kilometers across Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu provinces.