Party and government departments in Wenzhou have made savings of about 40 percent on the cost of receiving visitors after a new regulation on controlling costs took effect nearly six months ago.

In July, the city, in East China's Zhejiang province, introduced a rule covering catering arrangements for visitors arriving for meetings with Party and government departments.

All visitors and local officials now have to take meals, which cannot cost more than 60 yuan ($9.50) per person each, in the canteen in the government office building.

The number of accompanying officials has to be lower than the number of visitors.

Alcoholic drinks and dishes such as shark's fin, abalone and other seafood are not allowed to be served.

Wang Huiping, director of the rectification office of the Wenzhou city discipline inspection commission, said: "We tried to get the whole system organized to restrict all officials to the same amount of expenses for receiving visitors."

Wang said that, as a result, meals costing 50 yuan per person had brought savings of up to 40 percent on dining expenses.

However, the government has experienced some problems in implementing the regulation.

A few departments are still overspending on dining for visitors to the city, and some have deliberately delayed introducing the regulation.

Wang said:"We will have regular inspections on the implementation of the regulation to ensure all departments eliminate high expenses on official entertainment for visitors sooner or later."