EXPO 2000 closed in Hannover

The global exibition Expo 2000 in Hannover, Germany closed Oct. 31. The EXPO flag was given over to the hosts of the next exibition EXPO 2005 from Aichi, Japan.

During five months of operation, 18 million people visited the exibition. It was 22 million less than estimated as the organizers planned 40 million visitors, putting the German budget DEM 2.4 billion in the red.

The Baltic pavilions were among the top 10 most visited, according to organizers. The Latvian pavilion hosted almost 3 million visitors, while the Estonian pavilion attracted 2.7 million people.

Both countries' public relations representatives responsible for EXPO 2000 said that Latvia and Estonia won a place in the history of world expositions as countries able to create attractive and innovative solutions.

EXPO 2000 Estonian public relations manager Aili Ohlau said his country's participation cost 54 million kroons ($2.92 mln), including 35 million kroons in pavilion-related expenses.

She said Estonia hopes to get 6 million kroons from the sale of the pavilion. The pavilion has drawn six offers - five from Germany and one from Estonia.

Latvia hopes to increase the number of tourists visiting the country as a result of EXPO 2000, the pavilion's spokeswoman Solvita Vevere said. According to a survey carried out in the pavilion, half of its visitors are ready to go to Latvia as tourists, businessmen or students.

From Jun. 1 to Oct. 31. representatives of more than 250 countries have created a nearly 16-kilometer-long virtual ethnographic belt by using the program called "Zime," a sign.

More than 317,000 people submitted their names, birth dates, and their wishes for the future either in the Latvian pavilion in Hannover or via Internet, in order for them to be transformed into an ethnographic symbol and added to the virtual belt. The most active sign makers were Germans, leaving Latvians themselves in second place.

The Latvian Economics Ministry advised the government to sell Latvia's pavilion at an offered price without organizing an auction, Aivars Gulbis, the ministry's deputy director responsible for foreign economic relations, told LETA.

Gulbis said that at the auction, organized by the Economy Ministry, only part of the exhibits at the Latvian pavilion were sold, while nobody wanted to buy the pavilion itself.

Jens Roeh, owner of two private eco-farms, has offered to dismantle and re-erect the pavilion in the vicinity of Osnabruck, Germany, to establish a summer house for students of the Waldorf School.

That would save the Latvian government DEM 250,000 it would have to pay for dismantling and transportation of the pavilion. In order to approve Roeh's proposal, the government's decision is needed on selling the pavilion at an offered price, said Gulbis.

Roeh is ready to now to begin dismantling the pavilion.

The Lithuanian government has charged the State Property Fund to take over Lithuania's pavilion at EXPO 2000 and submit information about possibilities to sell the pavilion during the coming week. Potential purchasers have so far offered only DEM 50,000 for the pavilion with equipment. The Ministry of Economics pointed out that the pavilion could be sold at a higher price if it was sold together with the land lot.