Nearly 380,000 tonnes of kitchen waste was collected in central Chongqing last year, up by 64 per cent from a year earlier, the reports. The municipality's environmental sanitation group attributed the stark increase to a growing number of people who dine out, coupled with their habit of wasting food.

A migrant worker became so delusional that someone was going to kill him and steal a large sum of money he was carrying, that he scattered 20,000 yuan (HK$24,630) in the waiting hall of the Qianjiang district railway station on Wednesday night, the reports. A policeman arrived 10 minutes later and helped the man retrieve all the money. The officer said the man was heading home to Guizhou and was under a lot of pressure not to lose the money, as it was the combined wages for himself and four fellow workers.

A woman in Lanzhou returned 10,000 yuan to a bank after a clerk mistakenly gave her 40,000 yuan instead of the 30,000 yuan she was trying to withdraw on Friday, the reports. The woman said she didn't notice the mistake until several hours later when she counted the money, and she felt compelled to do the right thing and return it.

The Lanzhou government will this year shut down all coal mines with annual production capacities of less than 300,000 tonnes, the reports. Local work-safety authorities said on Saturday that 290 people died in work-related accidents in the city last year, four fewer than in 2011.

Hundreds of dead fish appeared in the Wuyong River in Guangzhou's Huangpu district over the weekend as the water appeared black and yellow, the reports. A local resident blamed refinery factories located upstream, but the district's environmental officials said that, despite the discoloration and dead fish, tests of water samples showed that the water quality was normal, and they suggested that the fish simply died from a lack of oxygen.

A Shenzhen man has been detained for allegedly sexually assaulting an eight-year-old girl last week, reports. The girl often played with the man's two children, and he bought her snacks from a local shop. Her parents were shocked when they found their daughter using feminine sanitary wipes, and she told them the man had taught her.

A school in a village in a remote part of Nanning's Xingning district has only one teacher and three students, as most families in the village have sent their children to schools in the city, the reports. The teacher said the number of students had declined by about one a year since 2007, when nine pupils studied there. Local education authorities said the school was kept open because the three students would otherwise have to walk 10 kilometres along a mountainous road to get to school.

A woman in Luchuan county, Yulin , has been sentenced to life imprisonment for killing her husband, who was pressuring her to abort their baby, the reports. During a pregnancy check-up in April 2011, the woman was diagnosed with hepatitis B. Angered when he husband repeatedly asked her to have an abortion, she killed him with a knife and tried to take her own life by cutting her neck, wrist and stabbing herself in the chest. She had a miscarriage and lost the ability to speak.

Rice and traces of white lime residue were recently found in the petrol tank of a Cadillac that frequently stalled in Wuhan, the reports. A mechanic said the contaminants could have come from low-quality petrol, but the owner insisted that they were added intentionally by the last mechanic who worked on the car. The owner said the previous engineer may have decided to carry out an act of revenge after quarrelling with him over the vehicle.

After winning the right to host to the Women's Tennis Association's Premier-5 Tournament for 15 years, starting in 2014, Wuhan - the hometown of tennis star Li Na - said it plans to build a tennis centre with a capacity of 10,000 people to host the event, Xinhua reports. No cost estimates or construction timeframe were given for the venue.

A fire engine hit a battery-powered bicycle in Xuhui district on Friday night, killing its rider and injuring his female passenger, the reports. The fire engine was turning right when it collided with the bicycle, which became stuck underneath the truck with its two passengers. The man died at hospital and the woman was still under observation.

The price of flour in Shanghai has increased by between 5 and 10 per cent this month, resulting in higher bread prices in many shops, the reports. The general manager of a flour manufacturer was quoted as saying that the increase was due to the central government raising wheat prices by 0.2 yuan per kilogram this year.