Briefs | Education authority encourages students to do volunteer work

The Education and Youth Affairs Bureau (DSEJ) is encouraging secondary school students to do more volunteer work. In a reply to lawmaker Lam Lon Wai’s interpellation, the education authority said that the bureau has been assisting local schools in building a record system of students’ volunteer experience. The education department hopes schools can note each student’s volunteer hours on their examination grade sheets. This new index of non-school performance is hoped to become a key criterion to help students in their personal development. In recent years, the DSEJ launched a volunteer program for secondary school students. As of today, 39 schools are part of the program, with 16,000 registered students.

More police officers transferred to the Unitary Police Service

The security authority has relocated more police officers to the Unitary Police Service (SPU), according to a dispatch signed by the Secretary for Security. Yesterday’s government official bulletin published the dispatch revealing that the SPU now has 116 people under its authority from its original 80 people. The extra 36 police officers come from other police departments. On September 15, the city’s new civil protection regime will come into effect. The SPU is the department responsible for civil protection matters. In 2017, reorganization of SPU commenced, adding a civil protection and coordination center. The SPU remains with 45 core staff within the establishment.

Non-local workers responsible for 30% of parallel trading

Non-local workers are responsible for a total of more than 900 cases of parallel trading recorded from January to August, according to the Macao Customs Service. During the same period, the customs authority organized more than 40 cross-department actions which cracked down on parallel trading. In total, over 3,000 cases were recorded. Parallel traders buy products from Macau and transport them to mainland China for resale. These goods are typically either restricted or otherwise difficult to acquire on the mainland. Seized products include cigarettes, alcohol, seafood, cosmetics and electronics. In August, the department raided six large-size parallel trading shops in Macau near the Border Gate, having confiscated goods worth over 13 million patacas. The authority reminded non-local workers to obey the city’s trade law and to not engage in illicit parallel trading.