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Thailand in party mood

AFP, Bangkok
With just over ten days to go until World Cup 2002 kicks off and football fever sweeping the country, Thai authorities and businesses are leaving nothing to chance.
One local pizza company is bringing an extra 200 delivery motorcycles on stream to cope with an anticipated surge in demand from fans too busy watching the action to do any cooking.
And the Electricity Generation Authority of Thailand (EGAT) will boost local power capacity by 12 percent to ensure it can cope with the nation turning on their televisions en masse.
"We may buy power from Malaysia if we have a shortage," an official from EGAT said, adding this had been done during national emergencies in the past.
The agency is expecting an increase of one percent on the national average power used from 1:00 to 3:30 p.m. each day, when the first matches will be broadcast, Praphan Faktes, president of EGAT's power generation division, told
Usage is then expected to surge by up to two percent during broadcast of the evening matches, he added.
"Power usage in the afternoon will be less than during the evenings because people will watch matches at their offices, where there are fewer televisions than homes," he said.
Mobile phone operators are also bracing for increased network usage during the tournament.
Total Access Communications
(DTAC) is expecting at least six million calls per day to be made by their 3.5 million clients.
"We expect the same levels of usage as on Valentine's Day for every day of the Cup," said Thana Thienachariya, director of DTAC's product and service group.
While Thais are not legally permitted to gamble on the World Cup, they are allowed to enter competitions based on the tournament -- a fact many newspapers have taken advantage of.
The mass circulation paper Thai Rath is offering a cool 10 million baht (233,000 dollars) top prize to a lucky reader who selects the tournament winner, while other newspapers are giving away luxury cars and trips to the World Cup itself to entice readers.
Many newspapers require entrants to send in a standard postcard available at post offices.
The Communications Authority of Thailand (CAT), the government agency responsible for the printing of the postcards, expects to double its normal annual print run to 60 million cards, mainly due to the massive popularity of the competitions running during the lead up to the Cup.
"It will be at least double the usual 30 million," said a CAT official.
Meanwhile, home-delivery of fast food is likely to surge by up to 40 percent throughout the tournament, the Thai Farmers Research Centre said.
Pizza Hut in Thailand plans to increase staff at its call centre from 150 to 200 during the tournament, while it will boost its delivery fleet from 1,300 to 1,500 motorcycles.
The research centre also predicts overall sales of televison sets this year could hit 1.9 million, a 13 percent expansion from last year, mainly due to the World Cup.